WHATCOM COUNTY, WA (MyBellinghamNow.com) – Week 4 of the high school football season is officially in the books and it’s about time we survey the local prep landscape to get a sense of where things stand.

We’ve had it all so far this season including Andy Olson and Borderites’ historic turnaround in Blaine, the dominant play of the defending 2A champs in Anacortes, a rude welcome back to the Northwest Conference for Bellingham, surprise turmoil in Ferndale and so much more. 

I’ve had the incredible luck of immersing myself in the season with help from our fantastic broadcasters, coaches that have been generous enough to lend me some of their time, stats from the great Tyler Anderson and WhatcomPreps, interviews with players and coaches from Allan Fee on The Zone and loads more you can hear about on our weekly Friday Night Lights show on KPUG. 

If you’ve found yourself busy with life and haven’t had time to follow your favorite league in the state, here’s a great way to get up to date. And even if you’ve kept on top of all the scoreboards, standings and stats, maybe there’s still something you can get. 

Here are your top stories from around the area.

 

The rise of last year’s underachieving 1A teams

We’re just four weeks in and already, three teams in NWC 1A have neared or surpassed their overall win total from last season. 

The Borderites have been the feel-good story of the year, with reigning NWC Coach of the Year Andy Olson guiding the effort in his second season in Blaine. They’ve already improved on their disappointing 3-7 record from last season and have gotten off to a 4-0 start for the first time since 1979. Their run-heavy attack led by senior Jaiden Paez along with a rock-solid defense has made them a new threat in the conference.  

Rating Percentage Index, or RPI, can be a flawed statistic, but still one used by the seeding committee at the state tournament. It uses opponents’ win percentage to take into account strength of schedule when ranking schools in each class. For what it’s worth, Blaine is currently third in the state.

If you listen to The Zone, you know Allan is a proud Sehome grad, but if you’ve really been listening lately, you’ll notice that Blaine has been the school that’s got him excited this season.

Speaking of run-heavy attacks, Mount Baker is another school that has impressed so far. As someone who’s relatively new to the local prep sports scene, I think it gave Ron Lepper a laugh earlier this season when I asked him why his team’s been running the ball so much. Dylan Moa has headed a Baker ground attack that’s ran for a staggering 340 yards per game, while not even attempting eight passes a game. 

Also, it’s still early in the season, but Coach Lepper and undefeated Mountaineers seem to have gotten their defense together, currently giving up about 11 points per game compared to 33 last year during their 3-7 season. This week’s matchup against Nooksack Valley will be very telling about their progress. 

Meanwhile, Meridian has shown that they’re not the same team as last year either. The Trojans got a tight win over Deer Park in Week 1 before going on to earn a pair of dominant victories. Their sole loss was to 4A Kamiak by a single point in Week 3. Senior running back Landon Downey has been a name to watch with seven touchdowns already on the season.

All three of these teams are putting up nearly 40 points per game, but the real challenge is just beginning. Blaine and Mount Baker are about to begin conference play against Lynden Christian and Nooksack Valley, both major steps up in competition from their earlier opponents, and Meridian will join in soon after. 

We’ll have a better read on just how much these schools have improved in a few weeks.

 

How to assess the Lyncs? 

Some people say you’re not defined by your record, and Lynden Christian is a prime example of that. 

Greg Terpstra and the 2-2 Lyncs have played arguably the toughest non-conference schedule of any school in Whatcom County. Their season started with a 28-7 loss to Vancouver College and, despite not actually being a college, Vancouver is no easy school to open against as one of the top teams in B.C. 

Their next three games came against 2A North Kitsap (the same school that ended Lynden’s season in the state quarterfinals last year), the defending 2B state champions at Okanogan and Lakeside of Nine Mile Falls, who defeated Nooksack Valley in the state tournament last year before falling in the championship. Their two wins, coming against North Kitsap and Lakeside, showed exactly why we should expect the same powerhouse Lyncs team to return to conference play, especially with their most recent 49-14 blowout over Lakeside last Friday.

Coming off an 8-3 season where they battled with Nooksack Valley at the top of the NWC, splitting your first four games isn’t exactly an ideal start. But it is worth noting that the Lyncs actually started off 2-2 last season as well before winning their next six games, so maybe this is all just part of the plan for Coach Terpstra and the boys at LC.

 

Who can stop the Seahawks?

It’s always a tricky game to name favorites not even halfway into the season, but one thing is for sure: 

Anacortes is the real deal. Again.

Heading into Friday’s match against Lynden, the Seahawks had made quick work of everyone they faced, outscoring opponents 150-7. And still, most people expected their game against Lynden to be pretty close. 

Anacortes had won 16 straight dating back to last season, and the only one of those games that had been decided by less than two scores was last year’s 15-8 win over the Lions. After falling in the state quarterfinals last year, Lynden pulled out a thriller against Ferndale in their season opener and continued their dominance over their next two games. Despite losing a good group of seniors from last year, there was real reason to believe Blake VanDalen and his Lions would finally give the Seahawks a long-awaited challenge. 

Unfortunately for Lions fans, Anacortes has been known to come out strong against most teams and last Friday was no different. They jumped out to a quick 28-7 lead and even though the Lions showed their resolve by staying in the game with the help of some absurd throws by senior QB Brant Heppner, the Seahawks stayed in control the whole game en route to a 35-21 win.

Anacortes graduated its state championship-winning QB from last season, but if you listen to our own Jim Bring and Dan Kaemingk, they haven’t lost much ground with their new sophomore starter Ryan Harrington. The Beaner Brothers are as advertised and have the rare athleticism to break out for a long touchdown at any given moment. The Seahawks kept most of its secondary together from last year, which is among the strongest in the state. 

If you’ve been following Anacortes, it’s clear that they play at a high level in every area of the game and it will be an incredible challenge to stop them from repeating as 2A champs. But, as Jim and Dan mentioned on the broadcast, the Lions at least showed enough in their loss that it’s not out of the question.

 

What’s going on in Ferndale?

No one batted an eye after Ferndale suffered a tight 28-21 loss to Lynden to open the season in what was likely the best game we’ve seen so far.

That changed the next week following their surprising loss to Oak Harbor.

After falling on a last-second field goal, the alarms started to sound for the Golden Eagles, who had now dropped to 0-2. This was an Oak Harbor team that Ferndale handled 26-6 last season before finishing near the bottom of the Wesco North 3A standings with a mediocre 4-6 record. 

However, it seems that Oak Harbor may have taken a big step up this season, as they’re 3-1 and currently ranked 10th in Class 3A by MaxPreps, so maybe it’s not as worrying of a loss as it seems. Ferndale bounced back the next week with a dominant win over Marysville-Getchell, but concerns resurfaced in Week 4 last Friday. 

Ferndale eked out a 28-21 overtime win over Mount Vernon, a team that the Golden Eagles trounced by 35 points last season and has yet to win a game this season. A win’s a win, but escaping winless Mount Vernon in OT is not the performance we expected from Ferndale this year. 

The Golden Eagles have two lighter games against Stanwood and Snohomish coming up, who own a combined 1-7 record so far this season. Assuming Ferndale wins both, their real challenges come in the last two games of the season when they face 4A Lake Stevens on the road in Week 7 and host Wesco North 3A powerhouse Sedro-Woolley in Week 8. 

Despite the shaky start, Ferndale is still getting respect from around the state. MaxPreps ranks them 11th in Class 3A and, if they can pick up a win over either Lake Stevens or Sedro-Woolley near the end of the season, the Eagles should make their way back into the top 10 come playoff time.

 

Hope on the horizon for the Bayhawks after a rocky start

Bellingham didn’t have much time to celebrate making their return to Northwest Conference play for the first time in over five years this season before Lakewood welcomed them back with a 46-14 dismantling. Things didn’t look much better in the following weeks after blowout losses to Anacortes and Archbishop Murphy. 

But it’s a high bar to meet when your first few games back in the NWC are against two of the top four ranked teams in Class 2A. It’s just not realistic for a newly-returning program to beat these established powerhouses in its first season back. 

Our own Dan Kaemingk made a great point on the broadcast last Friday when he said Bellingham is where Anacortes was a few years ago. They’ve just built their program to a place where it can at least compete against other NWC teams, but the Bayhawks are still a few years away from holding their own with the better teams. 

Maybe their offense has struggled so far, averaging just over 8 points per game, but it’s a team that was led by a quarterback who was completely new to the position. Junior Joe Harward, who previously played receiver at Bellingham, had been among the best quarterbacks in the conference as a run threat, but was up-and-down as a passer. However, Adam Leonard and the Bayhawks made an interesting adjustment last Friday that payed immediate dividends.

Bellingham went into halftime down 40-0 against Archbishop Murphy before slotting in sophomore Ben Leonard at quarterback. His second throw was a 79-yard touchdown pass to guess who… Joe Harward!

Harward seemed to feel right at home in his return to wide receiver, racking up four catches for 167 yards in the second half alone. Meanwhile, Leonard had a successful varsity quarterback debut, completing 6 of 11 passes for 191 yards. All that to say, it seems like Bellingham might have found a new spark on offense.

Still, it doesn’t help that the other two city schools have both gotten off to strong starts. Sehome and Squalicum are top eight ranked schools in Class 2A, each with 3-1 records so far. 

Northwest Conference football has a reputation for being among the best in the state with good reason. This season’s NWC boasts five of the top eight schools in the class 2A rankings according to MaxPreps, and reaching that group will be a multi-year process for Bellingham. Their schedule loosens up a bit over the next few weeks, so look for them to make their way into the win column after finding a potential breakthrough on offense.