Especially in a small, four-team league like the 5A Inland Empire League, it’s much more interesting when all the teams are good.

More competitive games. Less (boring) blowouts.

In football, Lewiston High had a lean stretch in recent years, after being among the top teams in the state in the 1990s.

The current group of football players to come through Lewiston has the Bengals back among the top teams in Idaho, which makes Friday’s 5A IEL matchup with Coeur d’Alene, at Bengal Field in Lewiston, that much more intriguing.

“This is a group we’ve been watching for a long time,” fifth-year Lewiston head coach Shawn Nilsson said. “We watched them play pee wee football, a lot of their dads are friends of mine. We’ve been watching them since the fourth or fifth grade. These were kids that were committed (in the offseason) to getting better.”

Last year, with a junior-laden squad, Lewiston went 9-2 and qualified for the state playoffs for the first time since 2008. Most of the key parts are back this year as seniors.

THE TRIGGERMAN for Lewiston’s high-powered, pass-happy offense is Colton Richardson, who has a scholarship offer from Idaho. The stocky Richardson, Nilsson said, was too big to play quarterback for years in Junior Tackle, so he had to play center.

Last year, he was listed at 6-foot-5, 225 pounds.

“He’s dropped 25 pounds (since last year), and he’s gotten faster and more athletic,” Nilsson said.

Richardson made some news prior to the season when he told a Lewiston TV station the Bengals’ expectations were to “go undefeated” this season.

So far, Lewiston is off to a 6-0 start.

“We did talk about not giving bulletin-board material,” Nilsson said. “Colton’s a confident guy, and I don’t want to take that away from him. You don’t want to take away that confidence, and that air about him. But also, we don’t want to to be saying stuff that other teams can use against us.”

Like this week’s opponent?

NILSSON WAS offensive coordinator under head coach Nick Menegas from 1990-98, when Lewiston made the playoffs all nine seasons and played in four state championship games. Nilsson, who played football for Dennis Erickson at Idaho, then bounced in and out of coaching at various levels in Lewiston. He was offensive coordinator in 2008, Lewiston’s last playoff team prior to last season.

When the Bengal head coaching job came open following the 2011 season, Menegas found Nilsson out running and convinced him to pursue the job. In turn, Menegas, who coached at Post Falls in the 1980s before taking the head coaching job at Lewiston, would join him as offensive coordinator in a role reversal of sorts.

“Nick’s a huge asset,” Nilsson said. “He could defininitely be at the college level. He’s as bright an offensive mind as I’ve been around.”

Truth be told, Nillson said he and Menegas thought they would get Lewiston turned around faster than they did. But a combination of injuries to key players, and a lack of depth, led to losing seasons the first three years, including a 1-8 record in 2014.

Last year, Lewiston was undefeated before Coeur d’Alene pulled away in the second half and won 56-28 at home. The Bengals lost at eventual champion Rocky Mountain of Meridian in the state quarterfinals.

“As juniors, they kind of exceeded my expectations,” said Nilsson, 51.

This year, Lewiston opened with a 45-38 win in Pocatello against Highland, one of the top teams in Idaho for decades.

Nilsson said the win over the Rams was “huge,” as it gave the Bengals confidence they could compete with the top teams in the state.

“Nick wasn’t real excited about the fact that I scheduled it,” Nilsson said of the Highland game. “I said I wanted to see how we’d compete at the next level. ... that Highland game was huge for us.”

The Bengals have another huge one on tap this Friday — against a team that has played its share of big games over the years.

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter@CdAPressSports.