Despite one of the toughest schedules in recent memory, our Kimberly Bulldog varsity football team finished the regular season ranked No. 4 in the 4A classification and will have a first-round bye in the state tournament.
Football has always been a beloved sport for the community of Kimberly. Football brings the biggest attendance to Bulldog Stadium. We have been blessed with a competitive football team for the last few years, despite the coaching changes. Our boys have embraced each new change to create a team of talented boys.
This season our boys had a front heavy schedule, meaning our football team played the best teams in the state at the start of their season. Playing better teams helps our football team to learn early on what changes need to be made to be successful in the latter part of the season. The boys started their season in Fruitland with a tough loss of 28-32. This close score had proved that the Kimberly Bulldogs were going to be a tough force this year.
The team went on to play Sutter Union (CA), Snake River, Homedale, and Sugar-Salem. These games showed the strength of our boys. The biggest game this season was against Sugar-Salem. The boys traveled to Sugar-Salem to face the Diggers on their homecoming. Sugar Salem is the returning state champion. Kimberly went on to win this game 17-14 with a field goal by Eduardo Paz as time ran out. This opened everyone’s eyes to the fact that the Kimberly Bulldogs are tough competition this year.
Senior Gunner Stringham said, “This season started out really rough with one of the toughest schedules in the class of 4A, but this led us to beat the number 1 team in the state Sugar Salem.”
Stringham said, “I would say our conference is somewhat competitive but some of the teams are very bad. Filer has been bad for as long as I can remember, Wood River has never been good for any of their sports. Gooding is very bad in football and are average in any other sport. Buhl was definitely our best competition in our conference. They are a tough team to beat.”
The Kimberly Bulldogs are having their best run at state for as long as the teachers can remember. The Kimberly Bulldogs deserve to be supported by their community more than ever this year.
Kimberly will play the winner of Fruitland and Teton next week at home.
Go support your Kimberly Bulldogs football team!