Youth Valley football looks to expand

Matt Unrau

Valley Press

Four years after its introduction to Sanders County the Valley Youth Football league is moving to bigger heights. In 2005, Bruce Knerr had just moved back to Thompson Falls from Missoula and was looking for a sport for his son in the third grade.

Soccer didn’t appeal to him, because his children wouldn’t be able to play them later on in junior high and high school, since Thompson Falls doesn’t offer it.

So, assuming the responsibility on himself, Knerr bought enough peewee football gear for 200 children and started the league. This included helmets, pants, shoulder pads and other essentials. Knerr bought most of the gear at Universal Athletics, but bought some from other exiting leagues.

That first year only Noxon and Thompson Falls sported teams, the next year Plains joined the league. Now, the three teams are hoping to see other towns like Hot Springs, St. Regis and Superior heading toward having their own teams also.

The first year Thompson Falls had 45 kids sign up for three teams, but this last year the total almost doubled ending up at 82 kids. Plains who lost a year and is trying to catch up to the other two teams had 12 kids sign up their first year, had 46 kids last year and already have 20 kids sign up this year without any advertising and with several more weeks to go before the opening camp.

Talking to Knerr, it is easy to see the passion he has for getting younger children the chance to play football when it is still fun without any pressure and giving them more experience.

His eldest son is now entering his first season of junior high football and already has 24 to 28 games under his belt, which is comparable to a full high school career. According to Knerr this is a huge benefit to any potential football player.

“The more time they get with the helmet on, the better they will be,” says Knerr. This helmet time will also give the kids a love for the game preventing them from quitting in the older leagues says Knerr.

Plains coach Juan Lulac agrees with the fun aspect of the league stating that his overall philosophy is playing everybody. “At this age kids should enjoy sports,” says Lulac.

He also agrees with Knerr that kids participating in the Valley Youth Football league have an advantage over those who don’t. According to Lulac when kids are younger they are more indestructible and can learn how to protect their body in the game preventing injuries when they reach high school.

Last year Plains had a big jump in improvement as their young team had a great season with their older team closing the gap between them and Thompson Falls and Noxon.

The league is made up of kids from first to sixth grade and also split up in two age groups, first to fourth grade and fifth to sixth grade. Plains and Thompson Falls both play 11-man football against each other and 8-man football against Noxon.

During league play the three towns will meet up at one location and play two games each on Saturday playing both of the other schools. Typically this day full of peewee football will start at 9:30 a.m. and last to 3 p.m. Last year each team played a total of 12 games during the season.

Both Plains and Thompson Falls hope to hold a football camp later this month and look for league play to start in late August or early September. The signups are open to both girls and boys.