BROOKINGS – The Bobcats play host to the Bucks in an Eastern South Dakota Conference game Friday night at 7 p.m. at Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium to get the football season underway.

Brookings is coming off an 0-9 season and has lost 10 consecutive games overall.

Yankton won back-to-back Class 11AA state championships in 2014 and 2015. The Bucks went 3-7 a year ago after losing their final three games, including a 53-15 setback at eventual runner-up Harrisburg in the quarterfinals.

“Yankton has 24 seniors; so they have a lot of seniors, they have a lot of kids that played last year – their quarterback is back, a good receiver is back. They’re well coached; that’s quite a coaching staff down there. They’ve had a lot of success, obviously, with two state championships in a row,” said BHS coach Lee Schmidt.

Yankton has won the last seven meetings with Brookings.

The last three games went down to the wire.

The Bucks won 29-28 on their home field to open the 2016 season. Yankton also was victorious in the season-opener in Brookings in 2015, prevailing 42-35 in five overtimes.

Yankton edged Brookings 34-33 in overtime in the 2014 state title game.

The teams did not meet in the regular season in 2013 or 2014. Yankton won single regular-season games over Brookings every year between 2009 and 2012.

The Bobcats’ last win came on Oct. 10, 2008, at Coughlin-Alumni Stadium – a 16-14 triumph.

About Yankton

OFFENSE

“We think we’ll see a lot of the same thing. They might come out in the Wing-T some and then they might spread it out and go five wide, so you have to be ready for that,” said Schmidt. “You know with (head coach) Arlin (Likness), you’re always going to get trick plays. He might come out and put down three linemen and put his tackles out on the sideline and run that wide-wide spread. So you just never know what Arlin is going to come out with – double passes, Statue of Liberty.”

DEFENSE

“Most of the time over the past few years we’ve seen them in a 3-4 (defense). They play a lot of man-to-man coverage. They played a little more zone last year,” Schmidt said.

SPECIAL TEAMS

“They’ve always been really successful at special teams. They always have good kickers, good punters, good return guys. They hurt us last year and got some big returns against us – got the ball back to the 50-yard-line, made some really short fields.

“I’m just being very honest, I don’t feel like we have spent enough time on special teams. But with the new South Dakota rules – the limited practice time in the fall – it’s making us use every minute of practice to try to get everything covered and ready before the first game. And I’m sure everybody else is going through that, too.”

For more on the 2017 Bobcat football team, see the Fall Sports Preview in Friday’s edition of the Register.