NLCTigerFan07

Unfortunately I am only responding from my phone since my work computer won’t let me get in the GID website. So abbreviated picks tonight: Concord (1-0) @ NorthWood (0-1): Both teams coming off great games against strong opponents. Impressed with the Panther Black Crunch defense holding East Noble to 15 points. Give me NorthWood by 4 Northridge (1-0) @ Wawasee (2-0): Both teams are coming off shut out victories. Are the Warriors really improved this year? Or have their opponents been bad? This week we find out. Raiders beat a down SB St Joe team. I expect the Warriors to be a better test for them Give me Wawasee by 7 Warsaw (1-1) @ Plymouth (0-2): Both teams coming off disappointing losses where their offenses couldn’t capitalize and their defenses could come up with stops. Surprised at how bad the Warsaw defense has looked this year. The Rockies have defeated the Tigers the last 6 straight seasons. However, I don’t think Plymouth is going to be very good this year. Fingers crossed the losing streak ends here. Warsaw by 21

Thanks for verifying. It was strange to see and unfortunately I can’t get to the site currently while I am on my work computer (shhhhh don’t tell my boss) but glad to know it’s something that can be fixed in the future. Will just have to use my phone for now

My week 2 mostly uneducated predictions: Concord (0-0) @ Jimtown (0-0): both teams did not play week 1, so not much to go off of. Mostly based on what I've read from the NIC threads, there seems to be a lot of uncertainty around the Jimmies. Breaking in a new coach, I guess I'll go with the Minutemen in this Elkhart County rivalry - Concord by 17 East Noble (1-0) @ NorthWood (0-0): should be a great game. The Knights defense crushed the Rockies last week, and will likely get a stiff test from a typically potent NorthWood offense under Coach Andrews. However, I think I have to give the nod to the team that already has a game under its belt - East Noble by 8 Goshen (0-0) @ South Bend Clay (1-0): this is an honest question; is Coach Park on the hotseat in Goshen? After the strong 2016 season, the Redhawks have a combined record of 4-27 over the last 3 years (with 2 of those wins over "little brother" Fairfield). Unfortunately that game was cancelled last week, but they do get to start off this season on the right foot by replacing Elkhart Central with South Bend Clay on the schedule. The Colonials beat Osceola Grace (who?) last week 7-0. If the Redhawks don't win this game, I'm not sure they'll win another one all season - Goshen by 17 Michigan City (1-0) @ Warsaw (1-0): Both the Wolves and Tigers played last week, so that is helpful. Michigan City destroyed South Bend Riley (why was this game even on the schedule?), while Warsaw outlasted a much improved Huntington North team. Last year's game was an absolute classic at beautiful Ames Field. I like the fact that the Tiger ground game was clicking on all cylinders last week and that they will be the home team. The Tiger defense has some concerns though... - Warsaw by 6 Mishawaka (0-1) @ Elkhart (0-0): The Cavemen lost in an instant classic to rival Marian in week 1, while the newly consolidated Elkhart High School makes its debut. Fun fact, Mishawaka has not lost to Elkhart Central or Elkhart Memorial since 2004 when Memorial beat the Cavement in the first round of sectionals. Since then, they have won 20 straight against the schools from Elkhart. Now that they have combined, will they be able to topple Mishawaka? I am going to say first game jitters and all the hype hold the Lions back in their first game - Mishawaka by 10 Northridge (0-0) @ South Bend St. Joseph (0-1): the home team has won each of the last 3 years games, however, after the Indians lost to Bremen last week, I say Northridge has the upper hand even though they have yet to play. Not sure what is going on at St Joe. They seem to be a program in decline. However, I do not have much insight into the Raiders. This is more my lack in faith of St. Joe - Northridge by 14 Plymouth (0-1) @ Kokomo (0-1): Both teams coming off pretty sound losses last week. The Rockies have defeated Kokomo each of the last 2 years after losing to East Noble in the first week. Kokomo is also a program trending downward with a new coach. This is more of a faith pick in Coach Barron and his staff that they will get the issues from week 1 shored up for a victory tonight. - Plymouth by 21 West Noble (0-1) @ Wawasee (1-0): The Warriors offense looked good and pretty balanced week 1. However, Lakeland is terrible. The Chargers will be a much better opponent to see if Wawasee could actually be improved this season. Last year West Noble had an undefeated regular season, including a 15 point victory over the Warriors. They lost quite a bit from last season though and lost to a Central Noble team that went 2-8 last year. I think the Warriors surprise some people and get this victory - Wawasee by 4

Penn @ East Noble - week 4 - 9/11/2020

Per the Penn athletics Twitter account, the Kingsmen will travel to banks of Bixler Lake in Kendallville and take on East Noble. The Penn game against Cincinnati St. Xavier was cancelled. I haven't seen what caused East Noble to drop conference opponent DeKalb. I know DeKalb and Angola both announced 14 day quarantines, but didn't think that would go into Week 4.

Both Garrett (3A) and Leo (4A) became available with Angola and DeKalb cancelling the next two weeks for quarantine after a DeKalb player tested postive. Unfortunaley for the HNAC teams looking for opponents, I would bet/guess Garret and Leo might end up playing each other this week instead. Garret could have been a good replacement opponent for either Triton or LaVille IMO.

1. I agree. With many area D3 conferences moving to a spring schedule this season, should open up plenty of Saturday opportunities if needed (and some much needed referees as well) 5. McCulley is a heck of an athlete and I wish him well this season. Only sticking point with LN could be how their defense plays. Of course, if you are scoring 60+ points a game... who cares about defense? 😛 They might do it back to back weeks with their game at Marion (who lost to Eastbrook 39-18) 6. North Side's QB is a stud, but he is not the only horse in the stable. The Legends could be legit this year and the next two weeks will give some more insight. As well, how about Northrop winning their first ever victory over Homestead in school history. It will be interesting to see if they can put together a solid season. The Bruins have always had plenty of athletes walking their hallways, but for some reason has not seen it translate into much success on the gridiron. As well, Homestead's loss of QB Luke Goode to focus on basketball (committed to Illinois) played a part in this. The Spartans will still be a solid team when this season is all said and done. 9. Southwood is far from some slouching 1A program. They have gone 41-8 over the last 4 seasons with 2 undefeated regular seasons and 2 sectional championships in that time frame. As well, if losing a game 29-26 is considered a "thud", you and I have vastly different definitions my friend. I have a feeling Knox will end up just fine this season and will push Pioneer for an HNAC title and will end up being their sectional favorites. 12. A little suprised by this final score as well, but excited to welcome the Cavement to the NLC!

It seems our NLC members have completely dried up and fallen off the face of the earth. With little to no insight, here are my predictions for week 1. Marian @ Mishawaka: For the first time in.... how many years? this rivalry game will be an out of conference competition. Welcome to the NLC Cavemen! Mishawaka hasn't lost to the Knights since 2011 and I do not expect that to change tonight. Both teams lost talent from good teams last year, but I'm going with the Cavemen. Mishawaka by 17 Plymouth @ East Noble: Both teams lose talented QBs, so that is always a toss up. The Rockies and Knights have had extremely good battles over the past few years. I'll take the home team between the two as both teams figure out their identities. East Noble by 9 Warsaw @ Huntington North: The Tigers whalloped the Vikings last year in the season opener by a score of 52-13. I think Coach Prescott will get Huntingon North turned around this year, but do not expect much to change this first game. The Tigers lose a lot of production on both sides of the ball, but 2019 All-NLC running back Juan Jaramillo will be a stud this year. Along with a number of other talented skill players, the only way the Tigers lose this game is if they do not execute Bart Ball cleanly. Warsaw by 20 Wawasee @ Lakeland: I truly have very little to go off on this one. Both teams struggled through 2-8 seasons last year. Now the Lakers have a new head coach this season. I would love to see the Warriors be more competitive this season in the NLC, and hope they get a good start in LaGrange tonight. Wawasee by 14

Exactly what I was about to say. Congrats @Tommy you've played yourself

Looks like Laville's senior quarterback announced on Twitter that he tore his MCL and possibly meniscus in practice and will potentially be finished for the season.

It was a hypothetical situation, calm down. Do not turn our NLC thread into a COVID thread, thank you.

I didn't include Starke county in my "scenario", thus making them a safe school to pick from. My statement of "school is literally at the very southern edge of St. Joseph County" was in reference to LaVille being "shut down" and thus opening that week up in Knox's schedule. And WOW - embarrassing spelling error there. It was late last night when typing up my post lol.

Welp... with tonight's news that Concord, NorthWood and Northirdge have suspended sports, I guess we'll be lucky to see a season. It will be interesting to see if Plymouth, Warsaw and Wawasee (and I guess Mishawaka for now - but they're in a "hotter" zone than the other schools) end up playing a season if those others do not. If most of the NIC gets taken out as well, it'll be interesting to see if unaffected teams try and stick it out for a season and come up with random schedules almost week by week or something. For Warsaw, depending on what happens, but lets say all of Lake, Porter, LaPorte, St Joseph and Elkhart county schools shut down football this season. Hypothetical schedule like this: 8/21: @ Huntington North 8/28: vs. East Noble (since East Noble would have an opening with NorthWood being shut down) 9/4: @ Plymouth 9/11: vs. Culver Military (since CMA would have an opening with Hobart being shut down) 9/18: @ Wawasee (move the game up earlier in the year to make way for a possible make-up for one of the suspended teams if they come back) 9/25: @ Knox (since Knox would have an opening with LaVille being shut down - school is literally at the very southern edge of St. Joseph County. Plus, who wouldn't want to see Radtke vs. Curtis?) 10/2: vs. Angola (since Angola would have an opening with South Bend Clay being shut down) 10/9: vs. Lakeland (since Lakeland would have an opening with Fairfield being shut down) 10/16: vs. Breman (since Breman would have an opening with South Bend Clay being shut down) It's not the most intriguing schedule (6 - 4A schools, 2 - 3A schools, 1 - 2A school), but it would be a full 9 game schedule (wishful thinking I know!). And would help those other teams fill out their own schedules due to programs being shut down. As well, while smaller schools, programs such as East Noble, CMA, Knox and Angola are no slouches.

I am an optimistic person by nature, however, I have to be honest at this point I see no point in trying to have a season. If as little as a single positive test shuts down all sports (I saw where Ohio set the rule that all participants (players, coaches, officials) are to be tested within 72 hours of each game. Any positive test cancels the game and appears to result in quarantine of all participants), what is the point? Newsflash - there are going to be positive tests for the foreseeable future. Without a vaccine, COVID-19 will not be going anywhere. I just wish people could accept this and either decide to stop everything completely, or learn to live with it and continue on. The continuous starting - stopping - starting - stopping is absurd.

This is the same as my thoughts about general reopenings as well. There HAS to be the expectations that there will be positive tests. There's no way this won't happen. So to shut down practices, restaurants, businesses, churches, etc etc because a single positive tests occurs.... what's the point in even starting/opening up. We have to learn to live with it.

Came to say exactly this. Ohio has been doing it following the 1st round of their playoffs for YEARS and it works great for them. Makes a lot of sense IMO

Another month since a post here. Not sure how many NLC fans are here. Any thoughts on how the season will shake out this year? Who has important players back? Who lost impact players? I might argue Mishawaka is the front runner in their first season in the NLC. However, they will have a heck of a 4 game stretch in the middle of the season @ Warsaw, @ Plymouth, home vs Concord and then @ NorthWood. Warsaw lost quite a bit from last year's team IMO, but I thought the same thing going into last season and they ended up winning their first ever sectional championship and were 11 points away from an undefeated regular season. What do the usual conference title contenders Concord, Plymouth and NorthWood have returning? How does Northridge look? Will they be able to compete like the 2013, 2014 and 2017 Raiders did? Or are they looking at a potenial sub .500 season for the 3rd year in a row? Any improvement at all expected from Goshen or Wawasee? Is there any heat under Coach Park when he sits down after going 4-27 the last 3 seasons since the Redhawks went 8-3 in 2016? (their only winning season in 12 years!) At least the Warriors have had 4 winning seasons in that time span, but the 4 head coaches over the last 8 seasons, can Coach Reutebuch bring some consistensy (and competitiveness) to Syracuse?

Per Chuck Freeby's Twitter - Russ Radtke leaving Portage job to become the new head football coach at Knox.

I'm so used to seeing your rankings that I overlooked it. Thank you for pointing that out. It wasn't meant in jest - only good fun. As a side note - I go back and forth with you at times on this forum, but in no way do I dislike what you post.

Aren't these your rankings? You tell us! 😂😋

Just out of curiousity, what do you not like about it? I would say it's better than Ohio's. I'll check out Kentucky and Illinois to see what types of differences there are.

Just a random aside here - I did not think Valparaiso and other schools in the Pioneer Football Leauge offered athletic scholarships? I'm assuming you obviously still have to get offered a spot on the team, but the scholarship is probably academic/grant monies right? Never fully understood how that worked for those schools.

As an avid reader of the NLC thread (obviously) - I would love specific examples of these types of comments that have been made. I cannot think of many that back your claim on any of these topics.

Literally makes no sense. Not every team can go undefeated in the conference, you know that right? Some teams will unfortunately be toward the bottom while others are more successful. And as I pointed out to you in a different thread, most years 4 of the 8 teams (Plymouth, Northridge, NorthWood, Wawasee) have been in the same sectional, and another 3 (Concord, Goshen, Elk Memorial) would be grouped together. That leaves a maximum of 3 sectional champions each year, and that's lucky to occur. The Duneland is guaranteed at least 1 sectional champion (6A - Sectional 1) and has a 75% chance of a 2nd (5A - Sectional 9) and a 50% chance at a 3rd (6A - Sectional 2). Hell they've got a 75% chance at a Regional champ in 6A! My point being - post season success is not a fair assumption on how good a confernce is or is not. Outside of Valparaiso and Merrillville - who in the DAC has made much postseason noise since in the last decade? Michigan City only just recently won their first 2 sectional & regional championships and are obviously on a good trajectory under Coach Mason. Crown Point had a 3-peat of sectional championships, but look at their overall record those three years... it's .500 (18-18). And again, they benifited from being in a sectional of all DAC opponents. At least 1 of them had to win it!

So to be clear... your point is BECAUSE Concord, NorthWood and Plymouth have been the only competitive/relevant teams in the conference in the 2000's THAT is why "interest has waned in your conference, participation and fan interest are down, and overall talent is probably at an all time low." That is a ridiculous take, even for your standards.