Section 9-Man: Mountain Iron-Buhl 5 peats returning to state, South Ridge falls

In Section 7 9-man finals at Mesabi East high school, Mountain Iron-Buhl beat Cherry for the title last fall. The Tigers were in the hunt for revenge against the Rangers on Friday night.

The Tigers struck first with the connection of quarterback Noah Sundquist to Noah Asuma for a 66 yard touchdown. The Tigers would give it all they had, but it wasn’t enough to take down the Rangers. Mountain Iron-Buhl won 56-24.

Throughout the game, the Rangers used their running game and nice yards in the air to get the win and another trip to the state tournament.
“It definitely feels great! I want to win it this year we’ve been here four years in a row now, this is our fifth, so it’d be great if we could win one,” said junior linebacker Damian Tapio.

Head coach Dan Zubich added that, “It feel great. I think the seniors, there’s ten of them and they never lost a game on our field, they never lost a section. We told them you don’t want this to be your last game so we were definitely looking to get that five peat.” The Rangers will enter state 10-0.

In Section 5 9-Man South Ridge would fall to Ogilvie 50-8 in Esko. Panthers finished their season 3-6.
State football action kicks off November 10th.