Class A Preview

Get 25% off your subscription by entering Knight25 in the coupon code area. Enjoy! Today, we finish off our class by class previews. For the last two weeks, we took a look at the best teams in each class, along with the best players, best games and some of the storylines that you should pay attention to going into the new season. All of this has brought us right up to the start of the 2021 season in week zero. We finish the series off with a look at Class A. PREP REDZONE PRESEASON RANKINGS 1) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/07/cashion-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">CASHION</a> (Coaches Ranking: #1) 2) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/07/pawhuska-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">PAWHUSKA</a> (Coaches Ranking: #3) 3) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/07/ringling-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">RINGLING</a> (Coaches Ranking: #2) 4) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/07/gore-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">GORE</a> (Coaches Ranking: #6) 5) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/07/thomas-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">THOMAS</a> (Coaches Ranking: #4) 6) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/07/woodland-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WOODLAND</a> (Coaches Ranking: #7) 7) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/07/pawnee-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">PAWNEE</a> (Coaches Ranking: #8) 8) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/07/morrison-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">MORRISON</a> (Coaches Ranking: #5) 9) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/07/hooker-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">HOOKER</a> (Coaches Ranking: #9) 10) <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/08/mooreland-team-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">MOORELAND</a> (Coaches Ranking: UR) <hr /> ALL A TEAM Offense QB - [player_tooltip player_id="52273" first="Ben" last="Harman"] - Senior - Cashion RB - [player_tooltip player_id="132426" first="Ethan" last="Mullins"] - Senior - Wayne RB - [player_tooltip player_id="189918" first="Gunner" last="Dozier"] - Junior - Gore RB - [player_tooltip player_id="189929" first="Tyler" last="Voss"] - Senior - Morrison WR - [player_tooltip player_id="53320" first="Landon" last="Lagasse"] - Senior - Cashion WR - [player_tooltip player_id="59991" first="Mason" last="Gilkey"] - Senior - Pawhuska OL - [player_tooltip player_id="101404" first="Camden" last="Billy"] - Senior - Thomas OL - [player_tooltip player_id="189919" first="Garrett" last="Douthit"] - Junior - Gore OL - [player_tooltip player_id="182545" first="Jaxon" last="Perry"] - Senior - Ringling OL - [player_tooltip player_id="189927" first="Parker" last="Payne"] - Junior - Thomas OL - [player_tooltip player_id="189930" first="Troy" last="Pearman"] - Senior - Oklahoma Christian Academy Defense DL - [player_tooltip player_id="189936" first="Jackson" last="Vandruff"] - Junior - Cashion DL - [player_tooltip player_id="160661" first="Lesharo" last="Wildcat"] - Senior - Pawhuska DL - [player_tooltip player_id="189931" first="Scotty" last="Taylor"] - Senior - Ringling LB - [player_tooltip player_id="189932" first="Brayden" last="Johnson"] - Senior - Ringling LB - [player_tooltip player_id="189926" first="Jack" last="Long"] - Senior - Pawhuska LB - [player_tooltip player_id="189939" first="Jackson" last="Rhodes"] - Sophomore - Woodland LB - [player_tooltip player_id="61148" first="Seth" last="Spady"] - Senior - Hinton DB - [player_tooltip player_id="189925" first="Conner" last="Scarborough"] - Senior - Mooreland DB - [player_tooltip player_id="101411" first="Dalton" last="Hurd"] - Senior - Pawhuska DB - [player_tooltip player_id="133792" first="Damontre" last="Patterson"] - Sophomore - Elmore City DB - [player_tooltip player_id="189933" first="Hudsen" last="Hill"] - Senior - Hooker Kicker/Athletes K - [player_tooltip player_id="189921" first="Dayne" last="Perryman"] - Junior - Gore ATH - [player_tooltip player_id="189937" first="Aidan" last="Rhodes"] - Junior - Woodland ATH - [player_tooltip player_id="189422" first="Barrett" last="Stevenson"] - Junior - Pawnee ATH - [player_tooltip player_id="189920" first="Jackson" last="Duke"] - Junior - Gore ATH - [player_tooltip player_id="189923" first="Loren" last="Snead"] - Senior - Mangum <hr /> MARK THE CALENDARS September 17th - Cashion AT Thomas It doesn't get much better than this to wrap up non-district play in week three. We'll see a rematch of last year's state championship game as Cashion will travel to Thomas. The Wildcats were able to beat the Terriers twice last year, with the second win coming in Wantland Stadium and ended with Cashion raising the gold ball. While they come into this season as the number one team and the favorites for the gold ball again, you know that Thomas has not forgotten last year. The Terriers will be waiting patiently for this date and an opportunity to knock off the champs. October 1st - Pawnee AT Woodland This is the first week of a two-week stretch that will do a lot of separating the contenders from the pretenders. Woodland, Pawnee and Morrison are all ranked in our preseason top ten and will be battling it out for district supremacy. In week five, Pawnee will travel to face Woodland. The following week, Woodland is at Morrison. Later in the year, Pawnee and Morrison will square off. This will end up being one of the toughest districts in the state, regardless of class. Whoever gets the win here will have a ton of momentum going into the rest of the regular season. <hr /> NOTABLE STORYLINES Gore Brings Back Everyone Whenever we're previewing teams and what their season may hold, we always talk about the talent that they have returning. For Gore, it's literally everyone. They bring back all 22 starters from last year's team and what's scary is they'll bring back the majority of their starters again next year. Some of Gore's best players are juniors and will give the Pirates not only a chance to contend for the title this year, but contend for it again in 2022. Head coach Brandon Tyler has completely turned around this program and turned it into a team to watch year in and year out. Before Tyler took over, Gore went 5-35 in four seasons. Since Tyler took over his alma mater in 2017, the Pirates are 35-8 and are knocking on the door of truly joining the elite teams in Class A. With literally everyone returning from last year's team, the Pirates have a chance to kick that door down and contend for a state championship this season. Ringling's Stingy Defense One of the top things we're excited to see as the 2021 season opens up is Ringling's defense to see if it's just as stingy as ever. During their state championship run in 2019, Ringling had nine consecutive games in which they shut out their opponent. Looking back on that, the stat still blows my mind and I've written about it plenty of times in the last two years. They went over two months without giving up a single point. Insane. Last year didn't feature a lengthy shut out streak but it did see the Blue Devils remain just as dominant as ever on the defensive side of the ball. They played just seven regular season games because of Covid and four of those games ended in shutouts. The other three games yielded just 18 points. All in all, they gave up 74 points all year, including a season-high 28 points in their semifinal loss to Thomas. Meanwhile Pawhuska, coming into the playoffs, averaged nearly 70 points a game coming into the playoffs. Ringling gave up 74 all year. Again, it's insane. We can't wait to see what the 2021 Blue Devils do on the defensive side of the ball. Two-Team Race Again? It's deja vu all over again. This time last year, we were talking about Class A being a two-team class with Cashion and Pawhuska as the heavy favorites to contend for the state championship. And that's how the 2020 season played out as both teams weren't really tested except in their semifinal clash against one another. Coming into the 2021 season, those same teams are atop the preseason rankings and appear to still be talented enough to make Class A a two-team race once again. However, just like in last year's case, unless one of these teams slip up in the district portion of their season and lose a game, they will more than likely be on the same side of the playoff bracket. So if these two teams are still 1 and 2 going into the playoffs, we won't see them clash for a gold ball at Wantland Stadium. Pawhuska's high-powered offense was limited in their semifinal battle with Cashion. In fact, coming into the semifinals, everyone figured we'd see a shootout and the final score was 7-6. Go figure. There are plenty of teams that will disagree that Class A is Cashion's or Pawhuska's to lose, but until they're knocked off, that's the way it stands right now. <hr /> RELATED <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/08/class-6a-d1-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">– Class 6A-D1 Preview</a> <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/08/class-6a-d2-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">– Class 6A-D2 Preview</a> <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/08/class-5a-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">– Class 5A Preview</a> <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/08/class-4a-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">– Class 4A Preview</a> <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/08/class-3a-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">– Class 3A Preview</a> <a href="https://prepredzone.com/2021/08/class-2a-preview/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">- Class 2A Preview</a>