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New wrinkles, same strong football team set for Adair-Kennedy
- Klas Stolpe
- 15 hours ago
- 6 min read
Crimson Bears bring talent, pep band, cheer squad to home opener
By Klas Stolpe
Juneau Independent
The Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé Crimson Bears football team will play their first home game of the season at 7 p.m. Saturday at Adair-Kennedy Memorial Park against the North Pole Patriots. JV action begins at 4 p.m.
“First home game of the year always has its own set of challenges,” JDHS head coach Rich Sjoroos said. “Everybody has to keep all their energy under control. First full week of school and all that kind of stuff going on, too. It is just a lot, but I think it's been a good week. But at the same time, it's going to be a good lesson learned because just because you win one week doesn't guarantee you win the next. I think that everybody's got to just understand that and continue to work to get better, and study film and learn their responsibilities and all that.”
JDHS, 1-1 in the Cook Inlet Conference, opened the season with a 16-6 road loss to the CIC South Anchorage Wolverines (2-0), and a 17-14 road win last weekend over the CIC Bettye Davis East Anchorage Thunderbirds (0-2).
“It is just week three of a long process, but it's been a challenging week,” Sjoroos said. “I think that it was nice just knowing that you can go on the road and win a game in a tough environment. Ultimately any of these games are hard to win. It has been that way for many years now, whether it be a conference game or a non-conference game. It's just the state of football that we play in. There are rugged teams and tough players and good coaches. And so it comes down to the basic fundamentals of good tackling and protect the football, and hopefully win the turnover battle and the field position, the kicking game, all of that stuff. There is just such fine lines sometimes between winning and losing, and last week was a perfect example of that. I just want the kids to understand that, embrace it and look forward to a game every week. And this one — especially being at home for the first time all year — should hopefully provide some extra energy and give us that boost that we need...North Pole is a good team with lots of seniors.”
Division II Railbelt Conference North Pole (0-2) opened the season with a 49-0 loss at the RBC Lathrop Malemutes and a triple overtime home loss to the RBC Palmer Moose 32-26.
“We have had two completely different games so far,” North Pole head coach Mike Hollett said. “Our first game against a tough Lathrop team that got away from us quick and a triple-overtime heartbreaker against Palmer last week. Our kids are in good spirits, though, despite the two losses to begin the season. We continue to work and grow, looking to keep getting better each week... It has been a long time since North Pole was in Juneau. Last one was when we were in the same conference, I believe, before Juneau and Thunder Mountain recombined. I have always respected Coach Sjoroos and his program. Playing in Juneau is always a unique experience with the stadium, fans and weather working against you. We expect a tough, physical Bears team that wants to wear you down on offense and then smother you on defense. In order to be successful, we will have to weather the storm early and be willing to punch back on both sides of the ball.”
One national prep football poll lists both of North Pole’s opponents in the top five of Alaska DI and DII teams: 1. DII RBC Soldotna Stars (2-0); 2. DII RBC Lathrop (2-0); 3. DI CIC West Anchorage Eagles (2-0); 4. DII RBC Palmer Moose (2-0); 5. DI CIC South (2-0). Rounding out the top 10 are: 6. DI CIC Colony Knights (2-0); 7. DI CIC JDHS (1-1); 8. DII RBC Wasilla Warriors (1-1); 9. DI CIC Service Cougars (1-1); 10. DII RBC Chugiak Mustangs (1-1).
The Crimson Bears will be wearing their home black uniforms and will be supported by the newly revised JDHS pep band.
“We are kind of dividing and conquering,” band director Brian Van Kirk said. “We've got new things that we are doing. We made a drum line and now we are going to have a drum line go to the football games, and then we are going to have the pep band go to the volleyball games.”
Van Kirk said the fall pep band will support those two activities, and the winter pep band — drum line and pep band combined — will support basketball.
“It is something that we have been talking about for a number of years, just trying to kind of figure out how to do it all,” Van Kirk said. “And working this year with Kristy Germain (Juneau School District director of operations) and Julie Herman (JSD activities director), we worked out a way to be able to get it going, and the kids are showing up, and it seems like everyone is excited about being able to do it.”
The fall pep band will perform drumline cadences.
“We hope to be able to interact,” Van Kirk said. “Adding to things like the kickoff, playing during timeouts, kind of getting a groove and really trying to get a good feel in the stands.”
The drum line will set up in a front corner of the stands and will not be hindered by the rain.
“That is actually the good part,” Van Kirk said. “Marching drums are not affected by the rain. They have kevlar heads and all of the metal on the drums are aluminum so there are not problems with rusting or anything like that and it allows us to be able to play and not worry about it.”
On just their third day of rehearsal, the drum line have not been able to put together complete uniforms yet, but the team captains have been working diligently.
“We will be trying to get some designs in here shortly,” Van Kirk said. “So then we can get some sweatshirts.”
Also ready for opening day are the JDHS Football Cheer Team, who started the season with a new coach but no uniforms.
“We are excited and very nervous,” JDHS head football cheer coach Carlene Nore said. “I feel we will be ready. You never feel you are ready, but it all works out and there will always be first game jitters and glitches. All things we can learn from…We have the old basketball cheer uniforms from 2017 and we were able to fit everyone on the team in the same uniform. New ones are in the works and we had a lot of support at our car wash.”
All that is left is to fill the stands with football fans who will appreciate the hard work the student athletes are putting in.
“You have to get into your routine where you have your school work,” Sjoroos said. “That has got to take priority and something we have really prided ourselves on since I came back in 2019 was having kids that do well in school and are good representations of their community. I feel that kids embrace that now. We cut practices back to two hours when school starts. At this point you have got your basic plans in place and then you throw wrinkles in here and there and hopefully you get enough kids there every day to get enough reps at it and be good enough at it come game time.”
Among top games this weekend, Soldotna, the three-time DII defending state champion, hosts Wyoming’s Star Valley, a four-time defending 4A Wyoming champion. West Anchorage travels to Littleton, Colorado, to face powerhouse Heritage, and South Anchorage faces Lathrop.
Following Saturday’s game JDHS returns to the road to face the Service High School Cougars on Sept. 5.
• Contact Klas Stolpe at sports@juneauindependent.com
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