The Superior Bobcats appear to be headed for a playoff berth in 6-Man football and coach Jeff Schultz thinks his team’s recent successes are directly tied to one thing that his team has done incredibly well lately, and that is the effective defense his boys have been playing.

Illustrating his point perfectly, the Bobcats went into Arlee and shut down the homestanding Warriors 52-6 Friday. Hoping to keep that defensive trend going, the Bobcats will host the Victor Pirates in their regular season finale this Friday.

Superior, now 6-2, looks to be pretty much a lock for the playoffs beginning the following weekend across Montana, but coaches like Schultz take nothing for granted, especially in situations like this.

“We want to finish strong, to play well against Victor,” he said. “They are a physical team that could present problems, we will have to play well to win.” The Pirates fell to St. Regis 46-6 in Victor Saturday.

Playing well has not been a problem for the Bobcats recently, the Superior boys have reeled off six wins in their last seven games, losing only to sixth ranked, unbeaten Seeley-Swan on the road during that stretch.

Schultz is quick to credit Superior’s defense and defensive coach Charlie Crabb for the turnaround.

“We switched some things around, coach Crabb made some adjustments on defense, and we have been playing very good on that side of the ball,” Schultz said. “That’s a big reason why we are where we are now.”

Schultz said the game at Arlee only continued that trend. “We know our offense is good, we have some playmakers,” he said. "What I am most impressed with is our defense. Our defensive line, in particular, has been playing well, and they really took care of business out front against Arlee.”

Schultz said Turner Milender (seven tackles with a quarterback sack), George Hanson (five tackles with a sack) and Logan Merrill (four tackles and yet another sack) were the defensive stalwarts for the Bobcats in Arlee.

On the offensive side of things, Milender ran for three touchdowns, Phil Catlado ran 37 yards for one score and threw a 33 yard pass to Landon Richards for another, Richards also completed a 65-yard scoring pass to Gannon Quinlan, and Conrad Talbot registered another touchdown on a six-yard run.

Shultz said that he was able to get a lot of players valuable playing time against the Warriors and hopes to be able to do the same this week against Victor. “Everybody saw the field in Arlee,” he said, “and we hope to be able to do the exact same thing this week.”