Columbus North’s Morgan Knapp hauls in a pass from Asher Ratliff over Southport’s Jensen Sosbe during Friday’s game at Columbus North High School.
Tommy Walker/For the Republic
Class 6A No. 8 Columbus North will face its biggest challenge of the season so far when it travels to 4A No. 11 Roncalli, while Columbus East faces another Hoosier Hills Conference when it travels to Jennings County in Week 4 of the high school football season. The kickoff for both games is at 7 p.m. Friday.
A win for the Bull Dogs Friday gives them back-to-back 4-0 starts to the season. The last time they started 4-0 prior to last year was in 2018. North won last year’s matchup with the Royals 14-0.
“We know the competition level elevates a little bit this week, and our guys are excited for the challenge,” North coach Logan Haston said. “We had a lot of success last year against these guys, but that’s old news. We have to go out and prove it again this year.”
Columbus East quarterback Kyson Villarreal gives a signal to his team during a football game against Columbus North in Bob Gaddis Stadium at Columbus East High School in Columbus, Ind., Friday, Aug. 29, 2025.
Mike Wolanin | The Republic
The Olympians (1-2, 1-0) will be the heavy favorites in its matchup against the Panthers (1-2, 0-0). Last year, East won the matchup 62-7.
Jennings is coming off its first win in two years, a 27-2 victory at Eastern (Pekin).
“Jennings County has got some good players. Watching them on film, they do a lot of really good things. They’re kids are physical and can fly around, and they’ve got some backs that can run,” East coach Eddie Vogel said. “We have not earned the right to just be able to mail the week in. We’ve got a goal to win conference, and we’ve got to make sure we maximize every day, and we want to win in the tournament. We’ve got to come out here and put some real work in and make sure that we’re better walking off the field than we did when we walked on.”
Last week, the Olympians defeated Seymour 49-34. To have success and win the HHC title again this year, Vogel said there needs to be consistency not in just one or two phases, but in all three phases of the game.
“We felt like we were the better team Friday night going in against Seymour, and I didn’t think we played very well. We were pretty efficient on offense, but defensively, we struggled to stop them,” Vogel said. “There’s a lot of things this football team has got to figure out, and we’ve got to improve on. We’re going to prepare for Jennings County, but we’re treating this week on us. Before you can battle and beat great teams, you’ve got to fix us.”
North’s game at Roncalli might be closer matchup than people think. According to the Jeff Sagarin rating, it only has Bull Dogs as a three-point favorite over the Royals. A big factor in the rating is the strength of schedule with Roncalli having the second hardest schedule through the first three weeks, compared to 174th for North.
It was five years ago that Roncalli was the Class 4A state champions.
“They’re a powerhouse,” Haston said. “They’re a storied program that is going to play physical. They’re going to play disciplined, and they’re going to play with a ton of effort, regardless of how talented they are year-in-and-year-out. We know that we’re going to face a good team, a team that’s not going to beat themselves. They’re not going to make a lot of mistakes and give up big plays, so we have to play very disciplined football ourselves and execute.”
East has to find a way of avoiding the big plays. Vogel said the Olympians allowed too many explosive plays the first two games and improved on it last week against Seymour, with the exception of a 60-yard run from the Owls 90 seconds into the game.
“Last week was better. We gave up two explosives that we consider explosives, but the first two weeks was a lot,” Vogel said. “We took a little bit of a step forward. We’ve got to get better at stopping the run, and again on the outside, not giving that play up where the receiver gets behind you. That’s something our defensive staff is focusing on. We might be moving some guys around, we’re trying to figure out the right guys on the field. It’ll be a better product and we’ve got to keep improving each week.”
The North defense and offense have both played well overall the first three weeks. The defense haa given up only two touchdowns in three games. The offense has put on a clinic, putting up an average of 51.7 points in the three wins.
The only bad spot for the Bull Dogs is the amount of penalties. They were penalized 11 times in the first half in the Week 2 matchup against crosstown rival East. Last week against Southport, they were penalized nine times for 90 yards.
North has to limit the yellow cloths being thrown at them, especially when the meat of the schedule begins Friday. They will travel to 6A No. 3 Carmel next week, and a Conference Indiana showdown when they host Class 5A No. 2 Bloomington South in Week 7 that will likely decide the conference title.
“We’re playing more complimentary football,” Haston said. “Our defense is taking care of things and giving the offense short fields to work with. We’ve been solid on special teams. The one spot that we have to clean up more is penalties, and that’s been addressed in practice. We’ll keep fixing it, but I’m really happy with what our guys are doing right now and the product we’re putting on the field.”
