Bluehawks hope to bounce back with first win over Bonners Ferry

The Thompson Falls High School football team vividly recalls last year’s disappointing 28-26 loss in overtime against Bonners Ferry (Idaho) to spoil last season’s homecoming for the Bluehawks.

The Bluehawks, who held a 20-0 lead, weren’t able to maintain it in the two-point loss last year.

Entering the season, Thompson Falls arguably had one of the toughest early-season schedules against Townsend and after suffering last week’s 51-6 loss at the hands of back-to-back, two-time defending champion Eureka, 51-6, they will gun for their first win of season against Bonner’s Ferry, a team that has been outscored 180-16 in their first three games of the season at 7 p.m. Friday night at Bonners Ferry High School in Idaho.

Bluehawks coach Jared Koskela isn’t worried about losing as long as his team is showcasing improvement on a week-to-week basis.

“We are still improving,” Koskela said after the loss to Eureka last Friday. “We put all of our poker chips down in the quarter and they were good at finding our weaknesses.”

T-FALLS STARTED to get production out of their running back Nate Wilhite in the loss to the Trojans.

“He is a workhorse and (running the ball) is something that we really didn’t do against Eureka,” Koskela said.

The Bluehawks struggled with injuries against the defending champs, and headed into this week that is something Koskela has expressed concern about.

“I worry about the injuries because I have two kids with concussions in key positions, and without those two players, that makes it a little harder to compete,” Koskela said. “It was a good game and hopefully, we can get those guys healthy headed into conference play.”

Koskela said he felt he and his Bluehawks team feel confident headed into the matchup with Bonners Ferry, a game that will be the last non-conference game before the conference season begins.

“There is that entity of revenge headed into this game,” Koskela said. “They beat us on our home field and our homecoming. These guys vividly remember losing and they’ll have that aspect to compete with coming into it.”