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Falcons sign, seal, deliver perfect 10 season
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on Thursday, November 20, 2008 (CST)
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By Jami Frantz, sports editor
With its third straight conference title in the bag, the second season has started for the No. 5 Friends University Falcon football family. They are matched up with No. 10 Northwestern Oklahoma State University (9-2) for the first-round NAIA playoffs at 1:30 p.m. this Saturday (Nov. 22).
In 2003, when Head Coach Monty Lewis came back into the Friends league, the consensus of the coaches was that there would no longer be any dominating teams, he said. The dynasties were over, and a lot of parity would happen now – though Tabor had won two conference titles in a row, Kansas Wesleyan tallied two and Southwestern College took home three.
Lewis took that as a challenge.
And now as the Falcons have clenched their third title, Lewis said the team is motivated to try to win three more.
In 2006, Friends went 8-1 in the conference and 9-2 overall. Bethel College (Tenn.) (9-2) defeated them 35-0 on the road in the national playoffs, but Bethel ended up forfeiting the playoff and its 10-3 season because it played an ineligible player all season. So the Falcons were officially 10-1 that season.
In 2007, No. 8 Friends went 8-1 and 9-2 again after the team hosted the national playoff for the first time and was defeated by No. 9 Missouri Valley College, 34-21.
The junior class hasn’t known anything other than conference championships. The senior class has known nothing but titles since they were sophomores, Lewis said.
But the Falcons must win a playoff to push the program to another level, Lewis said.
What to expect
The Rangers of Northwestern play fast, they play physically and they play to win, Lewis said.
“Our guys know it’s not physical; it’s mental,” Lewis said.
Northwestern returns its traditionally strong program to the playoffs for the second consecutive season under long-time head coach Keith Barefield. Like the Falcons, the No. 15 Rangers (8-4) were knocked out last year by No. 1 Sioux Falls (S.D.) (11-0) in the first round, 35-7.
Lewis hasn’t seen any weakness in any phase of Northwestern’s game so far. Defensively they are athletic, and how well the team moves jumps out at him.
For him, he knows the playoff will come down to a handful of plays, he said. He just doesn’t know when those will happen.
“I believe we will play well and put ourselves in position to win this game,” he said.
The road to another conference championship
“We’ve played awfully good teams this year,” Lewis said – like Kansas Wesleyan and Ottawa – to prepare them for what’s to come in the playoffs.
Friends knocked off Bethel College 41-7 Nov. 8 on the road. Friends was the final undefeated team in the nation at No. 6 at then-No. 23 Bethel. And the Threshers were upset by Ottawa the week before.
The energy and focus of the game was the best Lewis had seen all season, and the Falcons played a complete game with a dominating performance, he said. For the team, it validated its last two co-championships by making them feel like outright champions.
The Falcons took down the University of St. Mary 57-22 Nov. 15 on the road. St. Mary, then at 5-4, had the chance to win six games for the first time in its program, which was started in 1999. And although Friends was in the end zone in six plays, the team also kept giving the Spires good field position off of kickoffs, Lewis said. The Falcons forced turnovers with four interceptions, rushed for 400 yards on the ground and threw for almost 200, he said.
The top 10 placings in the nation for the regular season are as follows: No. 1 Carroll College (Mont.) 11-0; No. 2 University of Sioux Falls (S.D.) 10-0; No. 3 University of Saint Francis (Ind.) 10-0; No. 4 MidAmerica Nazarene University (Kan.) 10-0; No. 5 Friends University 10-0; No. 6 Morningside College (Iowa) 9-1; No. 7 Lindenwood University (Mo.) 9-1; No. 8 University of the Cumberlands (Ky.) 9-1; No. 9 Langston University (Okla.) 9-2; No. 10 Northwestern Oklahoma State University 9-2.
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