Iowa high school football rewind: An unexpected district championship for Starmont

CEDAR RAPIDS — When you’ve experienced the highs as a football program, then you go through the lows, it makes getting back to the highs that much more rewarding.

Starmont finished off a surprising regular season Friday night with a 27-6 home win over Maquoketa Valley. The ninth-ranked Stars went 7-1 and shared the Class A, District 4 championship with East Buchanan, the school’s first district title since 2010.

A resounding 46-0 victory over the Bucs last month gave Starmont the top seed in the district for the playoffs. It hosts North Butler (6-2) in a first-round game this coming Friday night, not a gimme by any stretch.

“Where we are geographically, we knew it’d be a tough go, no matter who we got,” said Starmont Coach Mike Augustine. “We’re ready for it.”

Augustine is in his fifth season as head coach after being an assistant at Starmont. He and the school have seen some lean times the past decade, as the Stars were winless in 2017 and 2018, having to forfeit games because of low numbers of players, went 1-8 and 1-7 the following two seasons, made the playoffs with a 3-5 regular-season record in 2021 and were 1-8 last season.

This is no ordinary program, as Starmont has been a playoff qualifier 17 times, including a 1999 Class 2A state championship game loss to West Lyon. This season’s renaissance has been uplifting to everyone.

“We’ve been slowly, steadily building up our numbers,” Augustine said. “We’re in the low 30s, which helps (because) you can play two levels now. It’s just getting the guys to commit. You look at the past, but you can’t live in the past. We know what Starmont has been in football and what it means to the community. Our core nucleus has grown each year, and now it’s an expectation. Our kids have bought in. That part has been a battle, getting that core to grow, but this sure does help.”

Friday night’s win was “classic Starmont smash mouth,” Augustine said, as heavy rain made passing virtually impossible. The Stars rushed for 287 yards, including 184 and a touchdown by back Anthony King.

Avery Vaske had two TD runs and Jase Tommasin one. Starmont’s defense shut down Maquoketa Valley’s Lance McShane, the state’s leading rusher, to the tune of 68 yards on 22 carries.

“The line did a great job of taking away his running lanes and staying square,” Augustine said. “We were flying to the football. Our defense has been lights out this year. It’s been so fun to watch them. They gang tackle and love hitting people.”

The only blip for this team was a 27-0 loss in Week 3 to North Linn, also a playoff qualifier. Starting quarterback Nick Wilfong missed the first two weeks of the season because of injury, was cleared a couple of days before the North Linn game and played only the second half.

He’s a junior, as are Vaske (the team’s leading tackler) and Tommasin. Important two-way sophomore Keaton Moeller is just a sophomore.

Starmont will graduate some important seniors, but this might be the beginning of another good run for the school.

“Going into the year, I told the guys the main goal was to get a team again,” Augustine said. “Play for one another and put the team first. They really took that hook, line and sinker. We got that group buy-in, and, boy, it’s been great to watch them all season.”

Augustine was asked what his expectations are for his club now that it’s the postseason.

“Keep building on what we’re doing,” he said. “Our good regular season put us in the position we’re in, but now everyone is 0-0. You’ve got to win to stay in it. We’re at the dance, so we might as well dance for a while.”

Playoff chatter

*A total of 26 teams from the Gazette area qualified for the playoffs in the lower four classes.

That’d be Union Community, Waukon, North Fayette Valley, Monticello, Jesup and Mid-Prairie in Class 2A. In 1A, that’s Cascade, MFL MarMac, Iowa City Regina, Sigourney-Keota and West Branch.

Class A qualifiers with Starmont are North Linn, Lisbon, Maquoketa Valley, South Winneshiek and East Buchanan. In 8-Player, it’s Turkey Valley, Belle Plaine, Iowa Valley, BGM, Central City, Edgewood-Colesburg, Montezuma and Lone Tree.

Recommended Reading

Iowa high school football playoffs: First-round pairings for 2A, 1A, A and 8-Player

*Connor Moberly scored on a 1-yard quarterback sneak in triple overtime as No. 1 Southeast Polk beat No. 2 West Des Moines Dowling, 37-34, in a classic matchup of the top two teams in Class 5A.

*North Scott scored 41 points in the first quarter en route to a 55-0 win over Clinton.

Comments: (319)-398-8258, jeff.johnson@thegazette.com