KADENA AIR BASE, Okinawa — Differing levels of urgency confront the Pacific’s best football teams just two weeks before the Far East high school playoffs begin.
Almost all teams have two regular-season games left. Two league titles remain to be clinched. And all the while, coaches must walk a tightrope between shielding players from injury while wanting them to play at full game speed.
"It’s a tough question. We’re going to have to arrive at the best conclusion for our team," said Tim Pujol, whose 10-time DODDS-Japan and Kanto Plain champion Yokota Panthers visit Robert D. Edgren on Oct. 24 — one week before hosting Guam High in the Class AA semifinal.
Pujol recalled a late 2005 regular-season game against Edgren in which he and then-Eagles coach Jim Burgeson agreed to play their starters for a few series, then use subs the rest of the way.
The teams then traveled to Korea, where Edgren lost the Class A championship 16-14 at Osan American and Yokota fell 13-10 at Seoul American in the Class AA semifinal.
Though nobody got hurt in the Yokota-Edgren game, "maybe not using our starters was a classic mistake," Pujol said.
That Edgren’s enrollment is just under 300 and Yokota’s is right at 300, down from 400 four years ago, reduces the available player pool and forces such critical decisions for coaches.
"We’re on a razor’s edge here," Pujol said. "With all due respect, you probably wouldn’t have the same level of concern if you were Kadena or Seoul or Kubasaki, a bigger group of young men to choose from."
Yet Seoul is facing other problems as it prepares to host Osan on Saturday. The Falcons lost 14-8 last Saturday at home to Daegu American; Osan beat Daegu the last time the teams played.
Falcons coach Julian Harden said he wants his players to press forward. "Trying to safeguard them from injury doesn’t help," he said. "I want them to play their hearts out, as if there’s no tomorrow. [It’s important to get] ready for Far East, but we have to go in with the mind-set that everything counts."
Once past Seoul, Osan hosts Daegu on Oct. 24 with a berth in the Nov. 1 Class A championship at Edgren on the line.
Despite being banged up, the Cougars will "play both to win (and) not hold anything back," coach Duke Allen said. "Seoul has a tough, quality, hard-hitting squad. They’ll be motivated. They lost on their home field and they’ll be fired up to win their last regular-season game."
Daegu coach Ken Walter could be forgiven if he chose to put on the brakes in his home game Saturday against Kubasaki; his team is also missing several key starters, but he echoed Harden’s sentiments.
"I don’t think you do well sitting idle," said Walter, whose Warriors will play for the fifth straight week on Saturday. "That’s how you get better. We figured we have to keep going."
By contrast, defending Class AA champion Kadena will have no game between last Friday’s 28-0 shutout of Kubasaki and its Class AA semifinal, when the Panthers host Guam High.
A similar three-week break between games Sept. 5 and 26 "was the most challenging experience I’ve had, trying to keep the fire burning and intensity up," coach Sergio Mendoza said.
He and offensive coordinator Steve Schrock plan to implement some "new things," Mendoza said. "It’s a great opportunity. One week to shake out the cobwebs, one week to implement new things and another week to polish it up."