Blue Valley, BV Northwest open with ranked EKL showdown

Several moments are inflection points in the Blue Valley Northwest turnaround, a team that was 0-9 in 2018. The first occurred when the current seniors were in eighth grade, and Clint Rider first came to the Kansas City area. The second happened when Rider revamped the Northwest weight room and classes. The third was in Week 2 of the 2019 season when Northwest capped a remarkable comeback against Harrisonville, Mo.

Those three scenes helped Northwest post a 5-2 mark in 2020, the school’s best winning percentage in a season since ’09. This fall, the Huskies are ranked No. 5 in Class 6A with multiple Division I prospects, including quarterback Mikey Pauley, receiver Max Muehlberger and lineman Gabe Peterson.

Overall, Northwest returns 14 senior starters, including wide receivers Nick and John Cusick, lineman Christian Repass and defensive backs Zach Yates and Sebastian Meriano. Pauley, a Nebraska baseball commit, already has shattered school records for career passing yards (3,845) and career touchdowns (38). Rider said the group has been leaders and helped raise morale around the building.

“We have spent a lot of time together,” Rider said. “These seniors are very special to me. They are very special to our school and our program.”

On Friday, Blue Valley Northwest faces Blue Valley, ranked No. 4 in Class 6A. Northwest has limited football tradition with zero state berths and three semifinal showings, the last in ’99.

Blue Valley is one of the great Kansas powers with six state championships and seven runner-ups, including ’15-16 to Derby. Last year, the teams were supposed to meet in Week 1, but that was pushed to Week 3 because of COVID-19. Northwest beat Blue Valley, 24-17. In the playoffs, BV won 24-7 in the rematch. Blue Valley finished 6-2, while Northwest was 5-2.

Blue Valley has its typical elite talent with offensive lineman Nick Herzog, dual threat quarterback Greyson Holbert, wide receiver Sterling Lockett, outside linebacker Hayden Essex, safety Michael Allen and kicker Charlie Weinrich. Like Blue Valley Northwest, Blue Valley seniors exemplify great talent and high character traits. Blue Valley coach Allen Terrell said the group highly cares for each other, makes right choices and are school and community leaders.

“In the 10 years that I have been here, I don’t know that we have returned this much leadership and character that we have this year,” Terrell said. “Not only are they super talented, they are unbelievable young men, and extremely high character, which to us is far more important than your talent level.”

“We have had super talented groups that have underachieved because of their lower character levels, and we have had far less talented groups achieve great things because of their character level and their accountability,” he added. “And this group – we are blessed, has both of that.”

Herzog has committed to Northwestern, Lockett to Kansas. Weinrich, considered by several services the state’s top kicker, has a KU offer. Holbert rushed for 720, passed for 944 and accounted for 18 touchdowns. Michael Solomon returns after 785 yards and eight TDs. Holbert was a multi-purpose threat before Jake Wolff left for Texas in 2020 because of COVID.

Holbert had previously quarterbacked Blue Valley’s freshman team to a dominant undefeated season. When asked for Herzog’s top qualities either on or off the field, Terrell immediately mentions the lineman’s character.

On the gridiron, Terrell said Herzog is “violent” with his feet and hands, a technician and one who wants to always improve. Terrell said Herzog “is as good as we’ve had” on the line and should play at Northwestern “relatively quickly.”

“He’s a ‘please marry my daughter’ type of young man,” Terrell said. “You forget that you are talking to a kid. He is so mature. We throw a lot of leadership at him, and a lot of other kids in our senior class. But just the fact that he’s going to hold kids accountable. He is going to hold coaches accountable.”

Weinrich was 29 of 29 on extra points and 7 of 11 on field goals with a long of 51. Blue Valley voted the perpetually positive Weinrich a team captain, rare for a kicker. In 7-on-7 practice drills, Weinrich snaps the ball to the quarterback to stay involved. He leads the customary post-practice breakdown.

“We trust him as much as anybody on our team,” Terrell said. “And he’s has good at his craft as anybody on our team. He is the best that I have ever been around in high school. He’s an unbelievable kicker, punter, kickoffs.”

For Blue Valley Northwest, the first moment came when several then-eighth graders and families attended the announcement when BVNW announced Rider as its head football coach on April 4, 2017. Later that summer, multiple eighth graders carpooled to the high school for workouts. They came from either Harmony or Oxford Middle Schools.

“It’s not like a small town,” Rider said. “Where you have got the high school and the middle school are right next to each other. It’s kind of a drive.”

Rider still remembers Repass’ mother’s van being “loaded down” with kids.

“There would be like seven kids in there,” Rider said. “…They set the standard for what they were going to accept and not accept in the weight room, and they lived that out for the last four years. When you have got guys that buy into the weight room and think it is important for success in the game of football, then I think good things are going to happen.”

Harmony and Oxford middle school football teams play each other in an annual game, which Rider said Northwest makes “that a big night.”

“After the game, we got in the huddle and we talked about the fact that after tonight, you guys are going to be teammates and you guys are going to be working together for the next few years,” Rider said. “And it’s just been really cool to see that come for fruition.”

Those early connections formed the foundation for an impressive turnaround for Rider and BVNW. In the two seasons before Rider, the Huskies finished a combined 4-15. Then, Rider posted records of 2-7, 0-9 and 2-7.

Rider and other coaches revamped the weight room culture and added freshman weight training classes in his third season, which Northwest hadn’t previously offered. When Rider first started, Northwest had 107 students in weights in five classes. Currently, NW has more than 400 kids in the weight room in seven classes, with more than 200 sophomores through seniors.

“The program has almost quadrupled in the time that we have been able to be here,” Rider said. “Our girls’ coaches, our girls’ athletes have really bought into what we are doing and what we try to accomplish, but to us, it’s all about us being a family, and not just a football family, but an athletic family. We have got tons of kids that are multi-sport athletes.”

Many of the current seniors started as sophomores in 2019. The Huskies ended its 13-game losing streak with a 34-28 overtime road comeback victory versus Missouri power Harrisonville. Rider had previously had turnarounds at Southeast-Cherokee and Hesston. In ’16, he led Hesston to a Class 3A runner-up and earned classification coach of the year.

Rider’s bedrock principles long come from Urban Meyer, the current Jacksonville Jaguars head coach and highly successful college coach with national titles at Florida and Ohio State. Rider has used Meyer’s E+R=O, or Event + Response = Outcome. Northwest recently had new E+R=O graphics, and it is stamped on the weight room window. Rider also uses the “Pull the Sled” mantra, which is designed to help everyone know their role and pull in the same direction.

The E+R=O equation solidified in the Northwest culture in the Harrisonville comeback. Northwest was down 14 points with two and a half minutes left when the Huskies turned the ball over on downs on the Harrisonville 1-yard line.

“The game was effectively over,” Rider said. “And one of our seniors at the time, coming off the field as our defense trotted on, said, ‘What’s our response?’ And that was a check for me. Because I will be honest, I thought the game was over, too.”

Northwest had a defensive stop, scored quickly, recovered the onside kick and went down and scored again. The Huskies narrowly converted a two-point conversion – “our toe was in the end zone,” Rider said - and won the game in OT.

“What a pivotal moment,” Rider said. “Could have gone really badly after that. Kids could have checked it in, but just how each moment matters and what our response is to that.”

Last year, Northwest broke through with the Blue Valley win, along with a pair of victories against Blue Valley West. NW ended a six-game losing streak in the BV series that stretched back to 2013. Blue Valley missed several players in the first game because of COVID. In the second meeting, Blue Valley held Northwest 58 rushing yards, 101 less than the first contest. Holbert, Essex, Allen and Weinrich were among those with big games.

“It was the difference that you want as a coach from the beginning of the season to the end,” Terrell said. “We are not afraid to lose football games. We are not about our overall record. We want to win state titles, and if it takes us losing Week 1 to grow, then we will lose Week 1.”

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