THE FRONT ROW with MARK NELKE: Lotsa Vikings in college, and more on state high school tourneys

Another signing period for those playing Division I football begins next Wednesday.

There was already a three-day early signing period in December.

Then there's different signing scenarios for Division II and III and NAIA schools.

However it all shakes out, one thing's for certain — there's going to be a lot of former Coeur d'Alene Vikings on college football rosters this fall.

Coeur d'Alene High coach Shawn Amos counted 20 ex-Vikings who are either on college rosters right now, or will be by next season.

THEY ARE:

Colson Yankoff — UCLA (Division I)

Jackson Kohal — Air Force (Division I)

Noah Gunn, Ross Chadderdon, Carter Friesz, Colbey Nosworthy and Trent Elstad — Idaho (FCS)

Kale Edwards — Montana (FCS)

Tyson Pottenger — Montana State (FCS)

Seth Harrison — Eastern Washington (FCS)

Luke McLaughlin - Furman (FCS)

Jake Brown, Brennen Crawford and Jack Prka — Carroll (NAIA)

Caleb Beggerly and Gabe Zanetti — Montana Tech (NAIA)

Pat O'Dell — College of Idaho (NAIA)

Isaac Edwards — Chapman (NCAA Division III)

Ethan Garitone — Santa Barbara City College (JC)

Carter Wiebusch — Undecided between Eastern Oregon, PLU, Montana Tech, University of Mary and perhaps others.

Eli Jolly would have made 21 former Vikings at the collegiate level, but is going on his LDS Church mission first.

Coeur d'Alene coaches believe this is the most Vikings on college football rosters at any one time — though they have been close to this number several times. Amos said more than 60 Viking players have had the opportunity to play at the next level since 2009.

"Good players make good coaches," Amos said, "which is probably why we have won an average of almost nine games a year for the last 12 years — 8.58 to be exact."

THE IDAHO High School Activities Association announced some pretty significant changes to its state basketball and wrestling tournaments, which we detailed in Wednesday's Press.

Here's a few more tidbits ...

The IHSAA learned a year or so ago that Meridian High was not going to be available to host the state 3A boys basketball tournament this year because of construction issues. Meridian has hosted the 3A tourney (and before that, the A-2) since the 1990s.

The IHSAA planned to move the 3A tourney this year to Rocky Mountain in Meridian.

"But due to COVID issues, two of the Boise schools opted out of hosting state basketball this year," IHSAA executive director Ty Jones said.

Capital, which usually hosts the 2As, and Borah, which usually hosts the 4As, are in the Boise School District. While most of the rest of the state took the governor up on his offer and increased crowd size to 40 percent of gym capacity, the Boise School District schools are staying with just four fans per player on the home team for now, with no visiting fans.

So the 4A tourney was moved to Rocky Mountain, and the 2A tourney was moved to Eagle. Columbia of Nampa became the new site of the 3A tourney, because the IHSAA didn't want a school hosting state that could possibly play on its home court.

Rocky and Eagle are 5A schools, and Columbia is 4A.

Ridgevue, a 4A school in Nampa, will host the consolation round and trophy games for 5A boys and 5A girls.

The IHSAA now has the option of moving the 4A boys and girls semifinals to the larger Ford Idaho Center in Nampa, but "that won't happen this year.

"The numbers, even it it's at 40 percent (of capacity), even if it's 75 percent, the numbers wouldn't quite reach the need to do that."

In recent years, fans have been turned away at the 4A boys semis at Borah, prompting the new option to move the games to the larger arena.

Jones said the Idaho Center will undergo what Jones termed "some drastic changes" for state basketball this year. There will be no seating in the lower bowl; all the fans will sit in the upper bowl, with no access to the floor area. The area around the court will look much like it does on TV, with the teams spread out in their bench area, and even trickling behind the baskets.

Media will be spaced out around the arena as well. Some of the other logistics, such as areas for parents to meet up with their players, are still being worked on, Jones said.

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