Area's 3 prep football survivors look ahead

Canton, Saline to square off; Chelsea renews old rivalry

Monday, November 06, 2006

BY RICH REZLER

News Sports Reporter

The football teams at Saline and Chelsea High Schools have achieved an unfamiliar level of success while Canton has reached the status quo.

Prior to this season, Canton coach Tim Baechler said he misses his early days with the Canton program when wins were "sweet and pure and lasted a long time.''

Instead of being allowed to savor each victory, the defending Division 1 state runners-up were being asked if they were going to win a state championship.

That's what happens, Baechler said, when you reach the regional final four times in seven years and "expectations get blown out.''

Still, the 11-0 Chiefs are two wins away from a return trip to Ford Field. The first is at 7 p.m. Friday when 9-2 Saline visits the Plymouth-Canton Educational Park.

Saline has won two playoff games for the first time in school history, and its Southeastern Conference rival Chelsea has reached the regional round for the second time.

The 10-1 Bulldogs - who host Fowlerville in a Division 3 game - won a pair of playoff games in 2000 before losing to Farmington Hills Harrison.

A quick preview of each game:

Saline at Canton

The teams' offensive success is strikingly similar, considering Saline has scored 412 points in 11 games and Canton 404.

A more striking parallel is that both teams' top three running backs all average six yards or more per carry: Canton's Deshon McClendon (8.1), Nick Moores (6.3) and Antwuan Hawkins (6.3); and Saline's Vince Helmuth (6.7), Austin Trott (6.4) and Mike Adler (347).

The differences are in the passing game (Saline's Kyle Brown has big statistical edge, though Canton's Steve Paye has proven to be efficient on his rare play-action passes) and defense (Canton allows an average of 9.9 points to Saline's 20.7).

The teams do have two common opponents in Pioneer and South Lyon.

Saline beat Pioneer 37-22 in Week 3 and 27-14 last week. Canton beat Pioneer 35-0 in Week 1.

Canton beat South Lyon 14-10 last week. Saline lost to the Lions 41-0 in Week 9.

Fowlerville at Chelsea

These programs - or, at least, the coaching staffs - are somewhat familiar with each other. The teams played season-opening games for four years, from 1998 through 2001. Chelsea won all four games by an average of 17 points.

"In some ways, it's a renewal of an old rivalry,'' Chelsea coach Brad Bush said.

While previous Fowlerville teams didn't have much success against the Bulldogs, they also didn't have Adam Powell at tailback. Powell has rushed 273 times for 1,705 yards and 11 touchdowns this season.

Fowlerville (9-2) upset previously unbeaten and No. 4-ranked Linden 38-23 last week. The Gladiators trailed 23-12 at halftime before rattling off 26 unanswered points.

Chelsea has already shut down a pair of potent rushing attacks in playoff wins over Carleton Airport and Gibraltar Carlson, but its offensive firepower has been most notable.

Last week, Chelsea put up 48 points against a Carlson team that had given up just seven touchdowns (an average of 5.6 points) all season. In just four starts, quarterback Jeff Adams has completed 52 of 78 passes for 795 yards and 12 touchdowns.

News sports reporter Seth Gordon contributed to this report. Rich Rezler can be reached at

rrezler@annarbornews.com.