Olpe’s opening matchup at Northern Heights on Friday night is, for Olpe’s Eagles, a chance to get a gauge of whether they’re as good as they should be on paper. For Northern Heights’ Wildcats, it’s a chance to see exactly what they have following the departure of a number of big-time performers.
The Eagles were 7-4 last year, head coach Chris Schmidt’s first season, and reached the second round of the playoffs, where they lost to Pittsburg-Colgan. This year, all of Olpe’s starters return except for one on each side of the ball, and both new starters are seniors. Big things are expected of the Eagles, whose returnees include decorated players as tight end/defensive end Josh Klumpe, defensive back/running back Cole Krueger, linebacker/running back Josh Lambert and offensive lineman/linebacker Alex Dreier.
“We don’t put too much on that emphasis to the kids,” Schmidt said. “Like you said, I think expectations are high, but we take one game at a time, and we know Northern Heights is going to be a good, solid ballclub. We had a good game with ’em last year. And they lost some kids, but they’ve got quite a few kids back, too.”
Heights loses five players who earned All-Area, All-Flint Hills League and/or All-State honors from last year, and return just one. But he’s a big one: Senior quarterback Kenneth Bronson threw for more than 2,400 yards last year while directing the wide-open Heights offense and earned an All-State selection.
Bronson will have several new targets this year, with the departures of running back Michael Glass, wide receiver Tyler McClellan and tight end Haydon Parks. Senior James Crabtree will step into the featured running back role. Junior Ethan Grother and sophomore Gail Lee will be new starters at receiver, joining returning senior starter Roman Murray. They’ll be facing an Olpe defense that returns four all-league performers: Klumpe, Dreier, Lambert and Krueger.
“Because we lost so many good receivers last year... I haven’t been real satisfied with the progress that we’ve made,” Heights co-head coach Greg French said. “We’re getting there, but it’s just getting used to new kids, and kids that have never played at varsity speed. Getting everybody on the same page is taking us a little bit of time. But Kenneth is doing a great job at the quarterback spot, and hopefully come game time, he’ll step in there and kind of take control and do what he needs to do.”
His counterpart on the Eagles, junior Matt Redeker, doesn’t have the statistics or hardware that Bronson does. But Redeker did throw for 1,084 yards and 14 touchdowns last season. With all of his skill-position teammates and four members of last year’s line returning, Redeker should be expected to have another fine year.
Across the line, Redeker and the Olpe offense will face a Heights D that brings back seven starters, but none who earned postseason honors. The Wildcat defensive line remains intact, with senior tackles Matt Railsback and Erik Pracht, senior end Ryan Swanson and junior end Joel Young.
A year after winning the Flint Hills title with a 5-0 league record, and a 6-4 record overall, Heights finds itself in something of a retooling mode.
“It’s always hard to tell (whether we’re ready for) that first game,” French said. “At times, we look decent, and at other times, we look like we’re nowhere near ready.
“But we’ve got a lot of young kids that haven’t played varsity football that are gonna be playing a lot of varsity, that I really feel like we need to play some games and get some experience. It may take us a little time to get exactly where we need. Hopefully we’re farther along than I anticipate.”
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