With a win over Blue Valley North last Friday, the Blue Valley Northwest football team finished their regular season play with a record of 7-2 and went 3-0 in district play to become District Champions and advance to the playoffs. BVNW has not been District Champions since 2010, and according to coaches, athletes and statistics, the football team had done exceptionally well throughout the fall season.

“I was very excited because it’s been awhile since we’ve won districts, and it’s been awhile since we’ve been seven and two so I felt like we did pretty good,” senior Jaqwan Stone said.

Offensive line coach Tenny Dewey agreed, the win over the Mustangs was exciting, and said becoming District Champions displayed that all the hard work the team had been putting in paid off.

“I was really excited for the players on the team, fellas’ have worked at it and they got themselves out of a hole at the beginning of the season, they didn’t let that get them down,” Dewey said. “They came to work, they came to play and it paid off by winning the next six games.”

For the first game of the playoffs, BVNW will face Olathe North tonight at 7:00 p.m. at the DAC. The Eagles are ranked sixth in class 6A, and Stone said he believes it will be a tough game.

According to head football coach Mike Zegunis, each week before a game the coaches get a scouting report by watching film study. The coaches get together on Sunday night and come up with a game plan that will help prepare the team to be the most successful.

“Olathe North is a really good team,” Dewey said. “They’ve got a lot of good athletes and they’ve got a lot of physical specimens, but we also reminded each other that we’ve already played a lot of good teams who have also had good athletes and physical specimens.”

Zegunis agrees that Olathe North is an extremely good opponent, but that will not hold the team back from doing their best.

“They’re big, fast, strong and physical,” Zegunis said. “But I think we are too, so it should be a heck of a game.”

According to Dewey in the first two losses the team did not do a good job of putting the quarterback in situations to be effective, but throughout the following six wins, the quarterback has improved heavily.As well as working on finding out which plays and routes best suit the quarterback, Dewey said the team has been working with the defensive line to better help the ball carriers.

“We’ve just got to get our body on the defenses body and occupy the defense and just create a little crease for that ball carrier to exploit,” Dewey said.

Zegunis said that early on the team had a lot of turnovers and took a lot of foolish penalties, but that they addressed the issue early on and because of that, became a better football team.

As far as the offensive line goes, Dewey said that they are doing well and that it makes a big difference having gifted athletes in the backfield carrying the ball.

Zegunis said that one of the team’s biggest advantages tonight will be playing at the home stadium, along with the team being confident and ready to play.

Since Stone was unable to play against BVN due to a concussion, he said he has spent this week getting healthy and preparing. He said that the team has been practicing hard and intensely daily.

“Everything is high-tempo and the coaches are very nit-picky on what we’re doing,” Stone said. “It’s going to be a very good, tough game.”

In order to help the team prepare, Stone said that having a good scout team in practice running their offense the best they can helps the Huskies get a good understanding and gives them a better look of what could happen.

“Stopping the run will be the biggest struggle because Olathe North does a lot of read option, so that’s going to be a big thing,” Stone said. “Shawnee Mission South did that to us and that kind of got us, so we’re going to have to do our best to stop that.”

Specifically, the team has been focusing on getting the right plays out to pick apart the ON offense and defense, Stone said.

“I know they [Olathe North] have a pretty good running back and quarter back and a linebacker that’s committed to TCU [Texas Christian University], so that’s pretty big,” Stone said. “I really can’t predict [what’s going to happen], I just know it’s going to be a good game and hopefully we can get the win.”

Stone also said that he expects the team to be very focused, intense and ready to play on Friday.

According to Dewey, attitude was a big contributing factor in the team’s wins. He said that the players are continuing to work hard and be positive as well as believing in their team.

“My hope would be that the fella’s come out with the mindset that they’re going to do all the little things right, they’re going to be disciplined, they’re going to play hard to the whistle and they’re going to play by the rulebook,” Dewey said. “If they do that, then that’s all we can ask, and it gives us our best chance to be successful week after week.”

Zegunis also said that having a good attitude and staying positive has helped the team tremendously, he said that the team has stuck through some pretty bad losses and worked hard to improve and play better.

“We started out one and two, a lot of teams and players might respond in a negative way when that happens, but our guys never did and they never panicked,” Zegunis said. “They just stuck together and started to take care of business.”