THE FRONT ROW with JASON ELLIOTT: Rivals collide, and the right start for 'Jacks

Sure, the bells haven’t even rung in some schools this year. 

But that hasn’t stopped some area schools from getting a few games in here and there.

The first of the big-league ones will come Monday for the Timberlake High and Coeur d’Alene Charter Academy girls soccer programs. 

THE TEAMS — along with the boys teams — will face off for the first time this season on Wednesday, each game at 4 p.m. at The Fields at Real Life in Post Falls in a pair of Intermountain League matches. 

Stacy Smith, in her 10th season as Coeur d’Alene Charter girls coach, has led the Panthers to nine straight district championships, and five straight state championships from 2016 to 2020. The Panthers notched the program’s first title under coach Dave Baxter in 2014, beating Timberlake in the state 3A title game.  

In 2022, Timberlake, seeded eighth in the tournament, upset top-seeded Coeur d’Alene Charter in an opening round game at state. 

“With playing Charter, and even when I was at St. George’s (from 2017 to 2023), she just has an aura about her,” said second-year Timberlake coach Logan Georgeadis, who went 0-4 against Smith in matches in 2017, 2019, 2022 and 2023 while at St. George's. “Her kids just show up each match ready to play. When we don’t play each other, we’re running through the league.” 

Last year in their two IML meetings, the teams played to a 0-0 draw, and Charter beat Timberlake 1-0. Timberlake was upset in the semifinals at districts, and Charter beat Bonners Ferry to advance to state. 

“Both teams had really good goalies,” Georgeadis said of last year's Timberlake-Charter games. “Those are always good games because of her coaching and presence. It’s good soccer and it’s my favorite game of the year. I know they’re not going to hold anything back, and neither am I.” 

In an effort to challenge his program, Georgeadis took his team to a jamboree at Lake City High, where the Tigers faced Lake City and Coeur d’Alene in 40-minute matches. 

“It turned out like I thought it would,” Georgeadis said. “We don’t have any club players on our team, and both of them have players that are playing year-round. We’re getting there, but we’re not quite a soccer team yet. I told the girls before we got there that we’re going to get scored on, but we can’t get discouraged. And both exposed some weaknesses we have.” 

Timberlake is visiting 5A Lewiston today, just one of a few games to challenge his program this season. 

“I was really pressing at the end of the year to big some bigger schools this year,” Georgeadis said. “I wanted the girls to face some adversity. Last year, we really didn’t have much through the season outside of the Charter games.” 

Timberlake is also playing district rival Lakeland and Coeur d’Alene as well this fall. 

“We were able to get a little better nonleague schedule this year,” Georgeadis said. “We’re really hoping to get them touching fields to get better exposure for the tougher games late in the season.” 

WITH A new coach taking the field for the first time in charge of a program, it could have gone either way for St. Maries football coach Hayden Humphrey last Friday as the Lumberjacks opened against the Lakeland JV in Rathdrum. 

St. Maries only won one game last season and in a small community like that, you just never know what the turnout the following season might look like. 

Humphrey, a 2015 St. Maries High graduate, played for coach Craig Tefft, who coached the Lumberjacks to a state 2A title in 2016. Tefft died of colon cancer in September 2023.

And this year, the numbers are up for the football program, with over 30 kids in the program. 

“With Tefft, we’d go somewhere and you’d have other coaches talking about how we had 50 kids on the team,” said Humphrey, whose team faces Salmon today at Big Sky High in Missoula, Mont. “Everyone wants to win, but it has to be fun for the kids. We’re just trying to balance that competitiveness and eagerness to win, but also making it enjoyable for the kids as well.” 

Judging by last Friday, if that team can keep enjoying themselves, they could be onto something again. 

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for The Press. He can be reached by telephone at 208-664-8176, Ext. 1205 or via email at [email protected]. Follow him on ‘X’, formerly Twitter @JECdAPress.