Benefield: Playoffs give high school football rivals another shot at each other

Peel back the layers of the Division 5 North Coast Section football bracket and vengeance appears the theme - getting another crack at a familiar foe that got the best of you the first time around.

Saturday’s quarterfinal matchup between No. 3 Middletown and No. 6 Kelseyville is act one in a drama that could stretch into the semifinals next week.

The first time these two teams met, the Middletown Mustangs got the better of the Knights to the tune of 40-8, but that was two months ago and this is the postseason. Things are different in the postseason.

“Obviously we have a healthy respect for Middletown, don’t get me wrong,” said Erick Larsen, head coach of Kelseyville. “But we are playing more as a team these past three weeks. (We) are playing for each other. On the field, they are working hard to not let the man next to them down. We are in a different mindset than we were when we played Middletown.”

They need to be: When the teams met on Sept. 16, it was 34-0 at the half.

“Middletown is a very good football team,” Larsen said. “They exposed a number of our weaknesses in that game and we spent basically a lot of the season working on those.”

It’s working.

Last Saturday’s win against No. 11 Arcata was the school’s first playoff game since 2005, Larsen said.

“The attitude in the past has been just to make the playoffs,” he said.

Now the Knights are believing they can do more.

But their road forward goes through Middletown - a tough assignment any way you cut it.

And Middletown might have a trace of vengeance on its mind, too. Because if they get past Kelseyville, the Mustangs could earn a rematch with No. 2 seed Fort Bragg, champs of the North Central I league who took them down 31-16 on Oct. 21 when both squads were undefeated in league. Fort Bragg plays No. 7 seed Ferndale tonight for the right to move on to the semifinals.

But first things first.

Middletown’s bread and butter is the run. Behind a beefy offensive line, the Mustangs ran for 354 yards against the Knights the first time the two teams met, including 115 yards on 13 carries for senior John Kelley and 91 yards on 15 carries for senior Ty Chorjel.

“Middletown ran the ball almost at will on us last time,” Larsen said. “We are making some adjustments on personnel on the run defense.”

One of those adjustments is likely to mean lining senior Dwayne Yiggins up at corner instead of safety so he can shift and help stop the Mustangs’ running game.

Longtime Middletown coach Bill Foltmer said the psychological edge could go to the team that lost the first time around.

“You’ve really got nothing to lose, you can gamble a little bit, more or less,” he said. “There’s just a little bit more pressure on the team that won the game - you have already beat them once and people expect you to beat them again.”

But in some ways, Saturday night is like facing a brand new squad, Foltmer said.

“They are a different team,” he said. “They have played good football in their last three games. They almost beat Fort Bragg.”

In the last game of the league’s regular season, Kelseyville had the defending champs on the ropes. The Knights were up 20-14 halfway through the fourth quarter, but ended up losing 21-20.

Foltmer likely needs no more proof than that box score to show that the Knights are evolving.

“The coaching staff, those guys have been doing a real good job,” he said. “We are going to be facing a completely different team.”

Fortunately for Foltmer, his team is the same group of guys who compiled a 7-1 league record. The Mustangs’ two preseason losses came at the hands of powerhouses Salesian College Prep and Berean Christian - the No. 1 seed in the Division 5 bracket.

Back to that vengeance theme again. With Berean sitting at the top of the bracket, the Mustangs would have to get through both Kelseyville and the winner of Fort Bragg vs. Ferndale tonight to have a chance to avenge their early-season loss to Berean Christian.

Foltmer said he’s relying on a defensive unit that has recorded five shutouts this season and held two other teams to eight points apiece.

“A good offense puts butts on the seats, but a good defense wins championships,” he said.

“Middle linebacker Ty Chorjel, Beckett Hoage - those kids, right off the bat, have to play well,” he said. “My line has been solid for me. They don’t make too many mistakes, they’ve got good size.”

Good size? Tell me about it. Line stalwarts Nick Billeci weighs in at 235 pounds, Colton Hall is 245 and Cameron Ketchum is 215.

And Foltmer adds Devin Ross to the mix, even at a relatively slight “180-190 pounds,” Foltmer said.

And how to stop a guy like the Knights’ Yiggins, who is averaging more than seven yards on each of his 148 runs this season, along with 13 touchdowns? A guy who also averages 13 yards per catch and has two receiving TDs?

“Gabe Guzman at corner,” Foltmer said. “He’s one of the best corners in the league. We are able to put him one-on-one in coverage and he gets the job done. It leaves an extra guy in the box to deal with a guy like Yiggins.”

The weather is expected to be fairly wet and miserable Saturday, so those backs for both teams will likely get a workout.

Foltmer, who’d love to move on and get another shot at Fort Bragg, knows full well that Kelseyville is likely harboring that same feeling of vengeance for his Mustangs.

“That feeling of getting another shot at somebody? That is what they are going to be feeling,” Foltmer said.

Still, both sides say that come postseason, everybody starts anew.

“Playing in Middletown, I really like it,” Larsen said. “It’s just good, small-school football. There is good energy; it’s a lot of fun because of that.”

And it’s always fun to get a second shot.

You can reach staff columnist Kerry Benefield at 707-526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com, on Twitter @benefield and on Instagram at kerry.benefield. Podcasting on iTunes “Overtime with Kerry Benefield.”