The 1A state playoffs are only three weeks away and it looks like the field is preparing for a run at what appears to be an unmovable roadblock in Mogollon. The Mustangs are now 7-0 on the year with two regular season games left on the schedule before the brackets are announced. The defending state champions are riding a 17-game win streak and a 22-1 record dating back to October of 2019.

Mohave Accelerated went 0-6 last year but the Patriots are 5-0 this season in what appears to be the biggest turnaround in Arizona. The Patriots are ranked No. 2 right behind Mogollon but the Patriots survived a scare Friday night with a 28-22 win over El Capitan but there are no “scares” on the Mogollon ledger this year.

St. David has been the only team to give the Mustangs much of a fight this year but the Tigers still fell to Mogollon 48-26 two weeks ago. St. David came into Friday night ranked No. 5 but the Tigers beat No. 3 San Manuel 48-14 so expect a switch in rankings come Tuesday morning. No. 4 Williams took Mogollon to the wire in a 38-30 loss in the state championship game last year and the Vikings are now 6-1 on the year with a game scheduled at Mogollon next week. That game might be a preview of the pending state championship playoff season.

St. David started out slowly against San Manuel Friday night and the Tigers found themselves down 8-0 midway through the opening quarter but St. David went into the locker room up 28-8 at the half and never looked back.

Jr. QB Ryan Gooding threw for four touchdowns and ran for another to help pace the Tigers past San Manuel. Talon Haynie picked up two TDs rushing. The Miners lost the use of Mathias Medina to injury a couple weeks ago and the overall quickness of St. David, especially the line, proved too much.

“Right now we need some line work. We need to work on some defense, a little bit more tackling than what we see right now,” San Manuel head coach Ernie Ivey explained. “It's been a long few weeks and we had some coaches out, there was only two of us here for a while, and we let things go and it showed tonight, you know, and we played a good team. Our defensive guys seemed lost out there and it won't happen next week.”

There’s still time for St. David to draw closer to Mogollon and the top of the rankings to secure one of the four first-round byes and time for San Manuel to fix a few things they saw on the field to stay in the playoff mix.

“We’ve got to eliminate some of our mental mistakes,” St. David head coach Braden Davis said. “We’ve got to get everybody healthy. We've got to keep playing hardnosed football. We’ve have to tackle a little bit better. We didn’t tackle great. We made up for it with our speed but Cody Didion played very well for us, our quarterback (Ryan Gooding) made some good decisions and Talon Haynie played really well, he got every yard he could possibly get. If you keep giving him the ball he will break one.”