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Indians drop from poll

From Staff Reports

COLUMBUS — The voters were not kind to area football teams as several dropped out of the Associated Press state football poll released on Monday.

Southern Local (7-1) recovered from its loss against United to take down Wellsville last Friday but it wasn’t enough to keep the Indians in the Div. VI poll. Last week Southern was tied for 16th place with Springfield Local (7-1). The Tigers also slipped out of the poll this week.

On Friday, Southern will host Columbiana (5-3) for perhaps its biggest game in recent memory. The Indians trail the Clippers by a game in the Eastern Ohio Athletic Conference standings. A win would give the Indians a chance at a league title with only Leetonia (3-5) standing in the way in the regular season finale. Like Southern, United also has one loss in the EOAC.

In league play, Columbiana has scored an average of 37.2 points per game while giving up an average of 8. In its first three games of the season — all losses to Mahoning Valley Athletic Conference schools — the Clippers gave up 36.7 points per game.

Through five league games, Southern had scored 38.6 points per game while giving up 20.8 per game. In its first five overall games, the Indians limited opponents to 10.4 points per game, while the last three games saw the team give up an average of 28 points per game.

As far as playoffs are concerned, the Indians — on a six-game home winning streak — will need to beat the Clippers to maximize their chances at making the playoffs. Southern stands in sixth place in the Div. VI, Region 21 field right now and have the best chance out of the league’s three Div. VI teams to make the playoffs.

West Branch (6-2) returned to the Div. III state poll last week but West Holmes put a damper on things with a 30-8 rout of the Warriors on Friday. Attention turns back to the Eastern Buckeye Conference on Friday night as West Branch travels to Marlington (7-1). Marlington and Alliance currently share the EBC lead with 4-0 marks in the league. West Branch is 3-1 in the league and could shake things up with a win.

Div. V South Range (4-4) is licking its wounds after its second straight loss to a much larger school. Louisville (5-3) clipped the Raiders 27-6 last Friday but it doesn’t get any easier for the Raiders as 8-0 St. Clairsville, ranked sixth in the state in Div. IV, visits South Range on Friday.

In Div. III, Canfield (7-1) was knocked off of the top spot with a surprising upset by Youngstown East last Friday at Rayen Stadium. For its efforts, the Golden Bears (6-2) were ranked 11th in the state Div. IV poll this week. Canfield fell to fourth in Div. III.

Over in the MVAC, Western Reserve (7-1) trails McDonald (8-0) by a game in the standings. The two will meet with the title on the line at Western Reserve on Friday night. Reserve has scored 41 points per game this season while McDonald, ranked eighth in the Div. VI state poll, is scoring 47.8 points per contest.

Other ranked teams of interest are Canton McKinley (8-0) in second in Div. I, Massillon (8-0) in third in Div. II, Hubbard (8-0) in third in Div. IV and Steubenville (7-1) in fourth in Div. IV and LaBrae (8-0) in fifth in Div. V.

See page 2B for the complete poll.

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