Sports editor
As the countdown to the opening game continues, Marion High School head coach Grant Thierolf said his players are ready to go.
A team of depth, which include 26 juniors and seniors, the Warriors are ready to get back to the playoffs for the first time since 2003.
It starts Friday with Lyons.
Marion defeated the Lions last year on the road in a hard-fought, 14-0 victory.
“We’ve generally had a good fall camp,” Thierolf said. “We’ve gotten some things accomplished, but at the same time we are a long way away from being a great football team.”
Although the amount of practice days are the same as always, a Sept. 5 start, more than three weeks since the first day of school, has the players ready to take the field.
“It seems like we’ve been practicing for a couple of months already,” Thierolf said.
All of the pre-season workouts lead up to the opening game between two teams familiar with each other’s work.
Lyons and Marion have split their four match-ups since the Warriors’ 2004 inception into the Mid-Central Activities Association, including a victory by the road team in all four games.
Matt Sandbo, a Kansas State University graduate, has taken over as head coach of the Lions in 2008.
Thierolf said Lyons has a new coach, but some of the same, and now more experienced athletes.
“Their skill players kind of scare you,” Thierolf said. “They are going to be quite a challenge for us.”
A new look
The MCAA has changed its format, at least for the next two seasons, in terms of how the standings are set.
Since 2004 the league has been broken down into two, six-team divisions.
This year and next, it will be one, 12-team league which will crown just one league champion at the end of the season.
Thierolf doesn’t think it will have much effect on the playing field.
“I don’t even know if most of [our players] are aware of it,” he said.
However, what it will effect is how the post-season awards turn out.
In the past, each division awarded all-league first, second, and honorable mention teams, now there will be just one of each.
“There are going to be a slug of kids that are left out,” Thierolf said. “It’s hard to gauge how the players do.”
Instead of having just five league games on the slate, the Warriors will have seven of their nine regular season games counted toward league standings.
Those games include: Lyons, Wichita Collegiate, Nickerson, Sterling, Hoisington, Ellinwood, and Hillsboro.