High School Football: What we learned from North Marion's week 2 win over Fivay

Thanks to traffic, this game kicked off at 8 p.m., an hour after its original kickoff time. The delay led to a cold start that left both teams grasping to control the game.

"I don't think starting slow was a schematic thing; it was execution," North Marion head coach Jeremiaha Gates said. "What we do on offense, we can't have negative plays. It's kind of old school, but you want to stay ahead of the chains."

Let's take a deeper look into tonight's premiere game. Below are three themes that taught us a lot about North Marion Colts Football.

Defensive battle or offensive struggle?

It’s hard to say a team averaging 30 points per game struggles offensively. At the high school level, scoring four touchdowns and having a stout defense are winning recipes. North Marion’s win over Fivay strengthens its claim as a team with the right ingredients. It just takes a while to produce the meal.

The Colts and Falcons were scoreless midway through the second quarter. North Marion's defense made its presence felt in the nearly twenty scoreless minutes a la several Jacob Zock defensive stops.

The undefeated Colts didn't experience the same friction but struggled nonetheless. Their offense is built on tempo, and it took a while for the team to catch its rhythm. Finding those steps earlier in the game may add a touchdown or two to their scoreboard down the season.

Then it got chippy…

The last minute of the first half changed the dynamic of the game. The Colts, with a commanding 12-0 lead at the timer, forced Fivay to punt.

A pair of North Marion took advantage of the momentum and used it to pancake block a player into oblivion. Flags decorated the field following the play and lit something in a Fivay team that wasn’t showing much life.

The Falcons responded the next play with flags and a few excessive hits off its own. This wasn’t the end of the aggressive play for each time. There was roughly a flag every three minutes for the remainder of the game.

Never say die

The 2024 high school football season is guaranteed to test the North Marion Colts. They’re a young team under a first-time head coach, after all. Friday night, Fivay tested the Colts mentally.

North Marion had the lead well into the fourth quarter yet Fivay kept swinging. A blocked kick, a 30+ yard touchdown pass, and an onside cut the lead by 13 points. More importantly, it gave Fivay the confidence to play with an edge.

"Guys have a chip on their shoulder on their shoulder right now and are trying to prove a point," Gates said. "There's nothing wrong with that, but I teach them to play with passion. I saw them play with emotion early on, so tempers went up and came back down."

As flags flew across the field for the remainder of the game, North Marion met the challenge with a score of its own with plenty of chippy plays to spare. It's one thing to fight when your back is against the wall, but fighting as you win shows another level of grit.

This article originally appeared on Ocala Star-Banner: High School Football: What we learned from North Marion's week 2 win over Fivay