4. Are We Forgetting About Linton/HMB?
Believe it or not, there are great teams in 9-man football that aren’t based around New Rockford and Lamoure. (No offense to everyone involved in those co-ops, but typing every town’s name every time we reference them gets old, fast.)
Linton/HMB went 9-0 in the regular season and did nothing but blow teams out. They ourtscored their opponents 484-60 and finished No. 3 in the final statewide poll. They started their playoff run with a similar outcome as they beat Lewis & Clark 55-8 in round one. Round 2 saw another big upset as South Border showed up and beat them in a tight game 26-22.
Lucky for Linton, they’re not starting over. They did lose some important seniors, which includes Larry Umber, the Region 4 Lineman of the year. Returning in 2026 are Jacob Ohlhauser, Isaac Silvernagel, and Justin Bosch. Three seniors that earned All-Region honors last season. It’s been awhile since Linton won a state championship, but if you remember, they won 3 out of 4 state championships in 2000, 2002, and 2003.
As much as it’s a chalk pick to say it’ll be New Rockford vs. LaMoure III, there is a team coming back that started last season 10-0 and spent those ten games beating opponents by an average of more than 40 points. Linton/HMB deserves to be in this conversation too.
5. The 2026 All-State Team Is Going to Look Very Different
Only four players return from the 2025 First-Team All-State team. It was a senior heavy crew with the following players back this fall: Thomas Allmaras (New Rockford/Sheyenne), Preston Arndt (LaMoure-Litchville/Marion), Colby Thielges (LaMoure-Litchville Marion), Kade Hentz (Hankinson). Whaddya know, New Rockford and LLM have 3 of the 4 returning members on the list.
We have discussed a few of the second-teamers coming back already with our Quarterback discussion. Kaden Moore, Westin Enger, Kelton Friesz are great players in their own right, and we just mentioned Corey Getzlaff in Alexander. We have others to keep in mind before our first helping of Friday Night Lights tomorrow.
The Next Group Up
Jackson Piatz (Napoleon)
Bryce Schneider (Napoleon)
Grady Larson (Kidder County)
Trayven Head (Divide County)
Trayven made the team as a sophomore last season, which should raise the eyebrows of everyone on his schedule. It’s one thing to do it when you’re 17-18 years old, but to do it as a Sophomore and to get recognized for it is rare.
The fun part when you lose all that senior talent is knowing somebody is about to make a big jump. By October these names and plenty of others are going to be well-known in the 9-man circles.
6. Region 4 Is Loaded With Familiar Names
If you’re looking for a region where things could get interesting pretty quickly, take a trip west.
Region 4 sent four teams to the playoffs last fall. Linton/HMB went 9-0 during the regular season, Grant County-Flasher and Kidder County both went 7-2, and Napoleon/G-S finished 6-3. Napoleon went all the way out to Alexander in the opening round of the playoffs and ruined the Comets’ perfect season with a 36-22 win.
Not a bad year for one region.
A Lot of These Guys Are Back
The fun part is that plenty of names from those teams are still around. Grant County-Flasher brings back Kelton Friesz, who was second-team All-State as a junior, along with fellow All-Region selection Elijah Ottmar. Napoleon has two returning second-team All-State players in Jackson Piatz and Bryce Schneider, plus All-Region selection Andre Doll.
Kidder County has Grady Larson back after he made second-team All-State as a junior, and Linton has Jacob Olhauser, Isaac Silvernagel and Justin Bosch returning from last year’s All-Region team.
That doesn’t mean one of these teams is automatically headed to Fargo. This is 9-man football, and we’ve already spent half this article discussing how quickly graduation can change things.
It does mean Region 4 gives us plenty to watch. Linton is trying to follow up a perfect regular season. Grant County-Flasher and Kidder County are coming off playoff wins, Napoleon already showed it can ruin somebody’s season, and a bunch of the guys who helped them do it are back.
I’m not going to pretend I know exactly how this region shakes out in August.
I do know I’m probably going to be checking the Region 4 scores quite a bit on Friday nights.
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