When Gilbert High dropped its fourth game in five tries to finish September, there was little sense in thinking there was life left in the 2010 Tigers. Except, however, if you are a diehard.
Count Gilbert coach Dan Dunn a diehard.
Mesa Mountain View decided Monday to take its football program in a new direction, removing Tom Joseph as its coach after nine successful seasons that included a state title, three title-game appearances and six region titles.
Florence survived the first half of its 3A quarterfinal matchup Saturday night with Round Valley thanks to two big plays on offense.
The Gophers thrived in the second half on takeaways and controlling the line of scrimmage.
The bruising ground game was there. So was decent defense. But turnovers nearly foiled Blue Ridge and its bid to reach the 3A quarterfinals Saturday night at Desert Ridge High School.
With a shift in emphasis to the running game late this season due to an injury to quarterback Parker Rasmussen, Desert Ridge ran headlong into Chandler High in the first round of the 5A-I playoffs Friday night and ended up running all the way to the second round.
The Jaguars spread-run offense cranked out 462 yards rushing and the defense made a goal-line stand in the final 40 seconds to preserve a 38-35 upset win over the host Wolves.
An all-White Mountain 3A semifinal? It has happened before. Could happen again.
That scenario is as much up to Winslow, Coolidge, Florence and Fountain HIlls as it is to Show Low, Snowflake, Round Valley and Blue Ridge as 3A quarterfinal matchups come to the East Valley on Saturday afternoon and evening.
The 5A-II state football playoffs are similar to 5A-I in that there is a prohibitive favorite in defending champion and top-seed Chaparral.
Beyond that the 5A-II opening-round games do not look anything like their 5A-I counterparts. The matchups ffigure to run like clockwork according to the seeds with perhaps the usual exceptions in a 9-8 or 10-7 matchup. And rather than one rematch of a regular-season meeting, there are four of eight in the initial battles for 2010 5A-II supremacy.
The 5A-I state football playoffs offers some suspense in the early going. Perhaps more so than in recent years so fans should rejoice in that aspect.
Hamilton (5A-I) is the prohibitive favorite to be sure with an unbeaten record and defending state-champion status. And it is a bit of an odd year when Mesa Mountain View and Brophy are double-digit rather than single-digit seeds and qualify with .500 records.