SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield Tigers are one more night of sleep away from their toughest test this season.
After a 28-6 victory over the Kerkhoven-Murdock-Sunburg Saints in last week’s Class A State Football Tournament quarterfinals at Crown College, the Tigers earned a return trip to U.S. Bank Stadium. The Tigers last played at U.S. Bank Stadium in the 2018 state semifinals against Mahnomen/Waubun.
This time the Tigers (10-2) will take on the undefeated Deer River Warriors (12-0) at 9 a.m. Saturday at U.S. Bank Stadium. Deer River earned its way to Saturday with a 26-14 win over Mahnomen/Waubun last week.
Taking on an unbeaten team midway through the season is a tough task for any team, but going up against an unbeaten team in the state tournament brings an entirely new challenge.
“In the middle of the season or at the beginning, you’re still kind of forming your identity as a team,” Springfield head coach Adam Meyer said. “You’re learning what kind of players you have, what kind of schemes are best for your team. Now that we’re towards the end of our season, you’re kind of set with things that you like and you’re doing things well, and both teams — everyone’s kind of set at this point. … Firing on all cylinders, both teams are, everyone kind of knows their identity and understand what has gotten them here and what they’ve done well to get to this point.”
While the Warriors look to be an imposing physical challenge, the Tigers looked good in their win last week and will look to carry that momentum into Saturday. That Springfield momentum saw the Tigers trail 6-0 before scoring four consecutive touchdowns on the way to the win.
Ashtin Johnson once again carried the ground game for the Tigers in that victory over KMS with 133 yards rushing.
That rushing game opened up the pass for Springfield quarterback Jakob Nachreiner, who bounced back from a couple of early turnovers to finish with 286 yards passing and three touchdowns. Nachreiner’s arm and vision definitely deserve credit for the aerial assault put on the Saints, but his wide receivers put in the work also. Carter Olson was Nachreiner’s favorite target in the win with 11 catches for 190 yards.
Nachreiner currently has passed for 2,553 yards, 33 touchdowns and 12 interceptions, while Olson is up to 80 catches, 1,032 yards and eight TDs.
Now, Meyer will hope for more of the same all-around success out of his offense against Deer River.
“Watching their film throughout the season, they’ve played a few different coverages against teams,” Meyer said of the Deer River defense. “So it’s going to be really interesting for us how they want to match up and the matchups that they put out there as far as their defensive backs and how they align in the box, and that’s going to tell us what we’re going to do offensively.
“We like when we can set the pass up early with our running game and once we get Ashtin going, and we’ve talked about this the last few weeks, once Ashtin kind of gets going, that down-the-field stuff opens up and that’s where we really like our receivers. We have four guys that we have a ton of faith in to win matchups and that’s the strength of our offense right now is getting that running game going and then finding matchups we like down the field.”
As for Nachreiner, Meyer said he believes his junior quarterback has improved each week this year and will be ready for this weekend’s challenge.
“As the season’s gone us, he’s really settled in and played with a lot of confidence,” Meyer said. “He knows the talent that is out there at receiver and puts the ball out and lets those guys make plays for him. That’s the beauty of playing quarterback when you have receivers like we do. If you get the ball out and get those guys in space, they can do a lot with it after the catch.
“But his confidence level has continued to rise each week, I think he’s understanding what’s expected and what he likes to do with the football. In our offense, the quarterback needs to make a decision almost every play. Even if it is a run play, we have things attached that he can pull it and throw it. There’s a lot on him throughout a game and there’s a lot of decisions he needs to make, and every week he just continues to get better with that. And I’m really proud of his growth throughout the season.”
But don’t focus too much on the big offensive plays made in the win over KMS as the Springfield defense made several key tackles and had multiple takeaways also. Ashton Toll finished the game with 10 tackles, while Mitchell Streich picked up a sack, MaCoy Krick and Brayden Sturm each had an interception and Sam Pidde recovered a fumble.
Sturm’s interception was his 10th of the season.
Defensively this Saturday, the Tigers will have to key in on the Deer River run game, led by senior running back Tygh Gullickson’s 1,638 yards rushing and 18 TDs.
“The line of scrimmage is going to be super important in this game, it’s going to be both offense and defense, but on defense, especially,” Meyer said. “We know they want to run the football, they have a talented running back in Gullickson, he’s a talented kid. Their fullback is also a strong runner and a good lead blocker, and they run their quarterback just enough to keep you off balance and he’s also a talented runner.
“So they have three different guys that they can run the ball with, and they’re comfortable getting 3, 4 and 5 yards a crack and they continue to do that all game long and obviously hope to break a big one as the game wears on. But they’re a physical football team, they want to get behind that offensive line, they have some big physical kids up there, and it’s up to us to match that physicality and play strong at the line of scrimmage to let our speed take over and make plays.”
While Deer River has been carried offensively by their ground game, it has mixed things up through the air. Senior quarterback Sam Rahier has thrown for 854 yards and 13 TDs and three interceptions.
Defensively, Deer River is led by 6-foot-3 linebacker Rhett Mundt (91 total tackles, three interceptions) and 6-3 defensive back Ethan Williams (six interceptions).