The 2025 state playoffs are underway as first round action started last weekend. Who will join the ranks of 9-man football state champs? Looks to be New Rockford’s year, but anything can happen. Today, we take a look through the 9-man football state champions from 1990-99.
I apologize that this isn’t a Bleacher Report/Buzzfeed style list where I rank all these teams that I didn’t watch and try to rage bait everyone into commenting. Let’s just take a look at these teams. If I find anything interesting about them, I’ll include it.
1990: Rolette Comets (11-1)
Tim Pfeifer led the Comets as head coach in 1990 to an 11-1 record and state championship. They defeated the Mott Cardinals 32-20 to take home the championship. Props to the Mott-Regent school website as they have a page dedicated to their entire football history dating back to 1925. Check it out.
I found this quote to be funny from the section on the 1990 Mott team. Also, more schools should do stuff like this for their sports teams. Obviously some years have less written about them than others, but this was very cool to see the amount of effort and time put in to honor their past athletes.
Snot-Knockers. I am not sure the year or who this was against but I remeber Loran Frieze telling the story that he went back to the huddle one time and he had snot dripping off his facemask and Jeremy Zentner asked what happened and Loren told him he received a snot-knocker. Jeremy thought this was really funny and got a good laugh over it. Loren stated that it didn’t feel that good. Sometime layer, Jeremy walks back to the huddle with a snot-knocker himself and had to agree that it did hurt a little. The entire 9-man squad got a good laugh over this.
The Rolette Comets lone loss in 1990 was to Westhope by a score of 22-14. They had 9 double digit victories including 50-0 over Berthed, 44-0 over St. John, 40-0 over Dunseith, and 36-0 over Mohall. The team pitched five total shutouts as they defeated Leeds 3-0 in the state semifinal, their closest margin of victory that season. Rolette is now part of the “North Prairie” co-op that won the schools first state championship since the 1990 team.
1991 – Hankinson Pirates (11-1)
There was not as much available for this team online. The Pirates lost the first game of the season in 1991 to Chokio-Alberta (MN) before rattling off 11 straight wins en route their first state championship. Throughout the regular season the Pirates won 6 games by at least two scores with their biggest being a 45-0 victory over Sargent Central. The playoffs was a different case for the Pirates. They beat Central Valley in Round 1 27-22 and Westhope 12-0 in the quarterfinals. The Pirates took on the defending state champion, Rolette in the semifinals and won 19-12. The state championship game was their biggest margin of victory as they defeated Underwood 24-7.
Hankinson won their second state championship in 2009, 18 years after the 1991 team.
The 1991 and 2009 teams share a rare bond. Both opened their championship seasons with a loss. The 2009 Pirates were blown out 43 to 8 by Wyndmere in the opener, but like the 1991 squad, they regrouped and knocked off the defending state champions in the semifinals. In 2009, that meant a 29 to 20 win over Hillsboro, the 2008 champs, before finishing the job against Parshall in the title game.
1992 – Wyndmere Warriors (12-0)
The Wyndmere Warriors finished the ’92 season as the first unbeaten State Champ of the decade. They also continued the trend of beating the previous year’s champion during their state title run. The Warriors defeated Hankinson 13-12 near the end of the regular season for their closest call of the undefeated run. Aside from that game with Hankinson, it was smooth sailing up until they took on the defending champs from Hankinson. The Warriors won 9 games by 20 or more points.
They defeated Hankinson 19-14 in the state semi-final before running into Towner in the state championship game. They had a a close battle with Towner, winning the game by a final score of 20-18. It was the 2nd 9-man state championship for Wyndmere as they had won in 1987 as well. They would win two more championships in 9-man in 2010 and 2017 as part of the co-op with Lidgerwood.
The digital footprint of this team didn’t leave much to the imagination. If anyone out there has some information about this group you’d like featured here, hit us up on Twitter. The DMs are open.
1993 – Sargent Central Cadets (13-0)
The first year of the “Dakota Bowl” was in 1993. Three programs won their first state championships ever as the championship game moved to an indoor location. Sargent Central was the first champion of the day with a 21-14 victory over Flasher-Carson. Des Lacs-Burlington won a slugfest against Harvey with a 6-0 final score. West Fargo won another low-scoring contest as they defeated Fargo South 6-2.
As far as Sargent Central goes, they ran the table on the season and only had 3 of their 13 victories within one score. The Cadets had six shutouts in ’93 including 5-in-a-row going into the playoffs. The momentum continued through the playoffs as they won their first three games 42-8 (Hatton), 54-22 (Leeds), and 53-14 (Thompson) before heading to the Dakota Bowl.
The Cadets raced out to a 21-0 lead at halftime. Geoff Bosse, Jason Bosse, and Cale Lewis all hit pay dirt in the first 24 minutes. Flasher-Carson made a second half push with Scott Kopp and Jeremy Zins finding the endzone. Kopp played well defensively as he intercepted three passes defensively. The game came down to Sargent Central recovering an onsides kick in the final minute capping off the perfect season.
1994 – Edgeley Rangers (13-0)
The Rangers first trip to the Dakota Bowl was a success, winning the championship 28-6 over Rolla. Not much available on this team from what I could find. Ten years after the ’94 team won the title, Edgeley, now co-oped with Kulm, made a return to the Dakota Bowl in 2004. The Rangers dominated the regular season winning eight of nine games by 28 points or better. They continued that dominance in the playoffs with wins over Richardton-Taylor 40-12, Burke Central 48-22, and Grenora 34-20 before heading to the Dakota Bowl. There, theyy met the undefeated Rolla Bulldogs. Edgeley took care of business in the championship game with a convincing win 28-6.
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