Over the past few seasons, the Charlo Vikings had become known as a high-octane football team that regularly scored more than 30 points per contest in a game when they had Landers Smith at quarterback.

Now that Charlo graduated Smith, who is currently playing football at Montana Tech University, they’ve had to improvise as they get used to a new era under head coach Reese Cox.

Cox, who is in his first-ever head football coaching gig after being named one of the Vikings’ assistant coaches in 2017, found himself in the head coaching gig after the unexpected resignation of both long-standing Vikings coaches Mike Krahn and Jim Peterson.

After the first two weeks of the season, Charlo and their rival Arlee were viewed coming into the contest from opposite ends of the conference spectrum.

Çharlo, a team that is built on the strength of its defense and an offense that is still growing under sophomore quarterback, came into the game scoring a total of eight points in the season-opening home game against Plains.

Arlee came into the Mission Valley game with soaring confidence, having manufactured over 60 points in their season-opening road win against Troy.

In spite of the Warriors explosive offensive capabilities in the first game, they were unable to topple Charlo in a 14-8 loss Friday night at Charlo High School’s football stadium.

The victory over their conference rival was a critical victory for the Vikings, who continue to work on finding their offensive identity, while holding Plains and Arlee to a combined 22 points, which is unheard of in the Montana High School Association Class C, 8-man football format.

The Vikings and Warriors experienced a seesaw battle, and the Vikings drew first blood when running back Isaiah Allik broke one for a 37-yard run.

Allick wasn’t done being the one-person wrecking crew against a Warriors defense that proved to be vulnerable to the run.

Allick broke two more runs to paydirt with a 1-yard run, and a 35-yard scamper to give the Vikings a critical 28-14 victory.

The Warriors weren’t without their highlights.

Nathaniel Coulson had a four-yard run, and Cody Tanner, Tyler Tanner’s little brother, had a 16-yard touchdown run to cap the highlights of the game.

Now that both teams have split the first two games of the season, they both move into critical week three contests with early-season conference implications.

The Vikings will play its third consecutive and final home game of the season against Flint Creek, a team before last week’s loss to Clark Fork had a 26-game win streak, and have won back-to-back MHSA Class C, 8-man football state titles.

Arlee will travel to play Seeley-Swan, a team that boosts one of the fastest and most athletic teams with the majority of their players being participants in last year’s MHSA Class C state championship track meet.

If both teams win their respective contests, they could once again find themselves in a familiar position, on top of the MHSA Class C, 8-man football conference for the Western portion of Montana.

In 2015, Arlee finished second in the MHSA Class C, 8-man football state championship, followed by Charlo in 2017, and since then in 2017 and 2018, both teams have managed to qualify deep into the MHSA Class C, 8-man football playoffs. If they win again this week, they could be on their way to continuing their recent trend, despite both teams having extremely young rosters.