Blink and you’ll miss it. That almost feels like the common refrain of fans of high school football as the wait during the summer evaporates into a regular season that comes to an end this Friday night.
For Star Valley the season has been another good one as they take an 8-0 record and a 17-game winning streak into their last regular season home game against the Green River Wolves which is scheduled to start at 6 p.m.
This year’s senior class has a chance to do something very rare and special in the annals of Wyoming high school football history, complete the three-peat. The SVHS program has won three titles in a row, but it has not been since the run of 1965-1967 which were considered “mythical” championships by the state with no state championship games being played. Those teams were under the direction of now late coach Lew Monsen.
The Braves had a run in the 1990’s under coach Robert Linford that had back-to-back championships take place in 1992-93 and 1995-96 with a gap in the fall of 1994 when the team lost in the playoffs to eventual champion Riverton. Most recently, coach Young has had a pair of chances in his tenure with the team winning in 2015 and 2016 but suffering an upset loss in the semifinals at home to Cody in 2017. The program won again in 2018 and 2019 but had a 16-14 loss in the quarterfinals of 2020 on the road in Douglas.
This year’s team has looked forward to the challenge rather than committing to the old sports adage of one game at a time. They have had a few important wins along the way including a 27-20 win on the road to Sugar-Salem in September and more recently, a 52-35 win at home over rival Cody.
“It is a special group, a lot of really good athletes,” said head coach McKay Young. “I think all of us have embraced the idea of a three-peat which can be the elephant in the room or something that you set your sights on and let it motivate you and they’ve don’t the latter. They’e but in a lot of hours toward that goal and they were almost all here every night during the summer and doing a lot of character building as well. We are excited about what the next three weeks hold.”
This Friday night’s game will have no bearing on the post-season seeding with Star Valley rolling into the playoffs as the 3A West’s top team. They will host the winner of Buffalo and Lander who play this Friday evening in the quarterfinals. A win there would give the Braves another home game for the semi-finals as they would host the winner of the #2E and #3W teams to try and earn a trip back to War Memorial Stadium in Laramie for the title game.
SVHS seniors include Bryson Nield, Smith McClure, Dayton Schwab, Gunner Brog, Hayden Morgan, Wyatt Martiny, Andrew Daniel, Catie Nichols, AJ Hale, Tayson Titensor, Cam Mickelsen, Tayson Stoker, Grant Thomson, Jayden Kunz, Riley Erickson, Andrew Taylor, Damien Burgess, Ty Johnson, Garrett Carlson, Logan Johnson and Cooper Lawson.
