6A St. Xavier (1-0) at 5A Bowling Green (0-1)

You know, football is a humbling game and as a Bowling Green fan, I've been spoiled for the past ump-teen years now, but along the way there were some corrections that occurred to keep BG grounded.  And BG got humbled last night.  Moving on!

With the season now underway, we get into a more challenging section of games on the schedule and that certainly includes this game for Bowling Green with away games vs Scott County and South Warren on the horizon and for St X with games vs Male and Cincinnati Elder coming up soon too. 

BG vs St X All Time Series

This will be the 8^th meeting for these two since Coach Wallace became St X’s coach back in 2018.  St. X is 4 and 3 in that shorter Coach Wallace led timeframe.  All time St. Xavier leads the series 14-8.  St. X won 8 straight games including:

-          From 1925 and 1926,                                     - From 1931 and 1932,

-          From 1981 and 1982, and                             - In the Rafferty’s Bowl from 2005 and 2006.

The Rafferty’s Bowl games were close with both roughly ending 14-7 St X.

From there, Bowling Green won 4 straight with some super teams from Scooter Hollis’ team in 2011 to 2014.  They then traded wins for the next 7 games with St X breaking that streak with 3 straight wins from 2021 to 2023.  But BG regrouped in 2024 and played their best regular season game of the year at St X and won going away 26-9 and in a lot of ways set the tone for BG to go on to win last year’s 5A State Championship.  So, Bowling Green is on a 1 game win streak in the series.

St. Xavier Information  (@Tigerpride94  does great job here!)

I watched the Jason Frakes video with Coach Wallace (link provided in my next entry) and he continually mentioned “Something to Prove” a lot during his interview.  I think this Tigers team is really embracing that mantra and trying to give their Coach a chance to play much later than the second round this season.  Another mantra I’m partial to is “There is No Substitute For Experience” and the Tigers are blessed with a list of players who have significant game experience on their roster and are led by those players that include:  

Senior QB Mason Trimble, Senior WR/RB/DB Marlon Harbin (UofL Commit) and Senior LB Karsten Busch (UofL Commit).

I also think WR Lucas Shelton is key for this Tigers team as it can balance the field a little to not have to rely on Harbin to make all the plays.  The Oline has very solid guys like Luka Bentz and Benjamin Pinkston to look to.  But I really think while this X defense isn’t as big in some spots as in years past, they are much faster as a unit and that will be a problem for most teams they face.

I sat with @Tigerpride94 for the Owensboro game and came away ultra-impressed with the Tigers.  They are the real deal this season.

Bowling Green Information

You aren't winning every game; that's not possible, but as a fan you just come to expect it.  Well, that mentality got an ice-cold bucket of water poured on all BG fans last night.  Lot of adversity, but in the end, no one cares about that, and no one is crying for BG, nor should they, but it's going to be very visible in how they react going forward.  And we shall see.

As I said in the OCath Predictions/Updates thread, I don't think BG wanted to put the game on the line for new QB Jaxon Strautman, but it ended up playing out that way.  I thought he played ok outside of the on INT.  He played hard and ran the ball hard.  But I don't think he should have had as many carries as he was forced to or called to.  As @Brown mentioned, the deep ball was there, but BG didn't look to that IMO, nor did they look for anything over the middle.  BG couldn't run well, but that was due to the defense OCath was playing that BG didn't adjust to.  That has to change.  Outside of the blocked punt, not much went right for BG last night.  OCath played well and tip of the cap to them, but BG has to do better.

However, for the last 4 seasons at least BG has started the season pretty slow.  In 2021 losing to Highlands in the opening game (that was a brand new fledgling Bluebirds team), in 2023 giving up 800 yards offense and losing a shootout with LCA, in 2024 falling apart after the first quarter and losing to Frederick Douglass; and even in 2022 they didn't play very well in beating North Hardin.  So, BG has certainly not come out of the gate hot in last handful of years.  But this season may be the most challenging with a slate of very tough teams coming (mostly on the road) and key players out for an unknown period of time.  We are going to find out what BG is made of this season.

Game Information:

This game will be played at Bowling Green High School.  It will be St X’s third game at Bowling Green’s new turf field.  The Tiger romped the Purples at BG in 2021 27-0; it was a little closer in 2023 X winning 27-12.  I was hoping for a closer game going into this year, but after last night I'm just looking to try to not get running clocked.  

Who wins this game and why?

Coach Kevin Wallace Sendoff

St. Xavier Head Coach Kevin Wallace will be retiring after the 2025 Football Season, and he has had a Great Run!  He is currently 3^rd on the active head coaching win list with 362 wins (if my count is right) only behind Coach Dudley at Bell County and Coach French at Middlesboro (and 4^th overall also behind legendary Belfry Head Coach Haywood).  And Coach Wallace got the majority of his wins coaching the sidelines of Bowling Green High where he took over for Coach Dan Haley (who in many ways provided the structure for the success Purples Football has enjoyed – as touched on in the interview provided by @Tigerpride94 earlier:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/god-kentucky/id1834692200?I=1000722987635

) in 1996 and moved to St X after the 2017 season for a total of 22 seasons at BG.  He won a total of 254 games at BG losing 41 for an .861-win percentage.  People forget he led 3 BG teams to back-to back to back runner up slots in 3A in 2005 (vs Lex Cath) and 2006 (vs CovCath) and in 5A in 2007 (vs Highlands).  His best Purples teams won a total of 5 5A Championships in 6 years from 2011 to 2016 (only falling in 2014 during that period vs the memorable Graves County game).  So, in the 12 seasons from 2005 through the 2016 season, Coach Wallace's BG teams went to the semi-finals every year but 3.  And they went to the state finals in 8 of those years, winning 5.  Impressive!

He also led the Tigers to the 2021 6A State Championship vs a very talented Male squad.  That’s a total of 6 State Championships!  Certainly, a portion of the respect BG now garners can be attributed to the efforts of Coach Kevin Wallace. 

Interestingly, during the interview mentioned above was the 2013 game vs Blackman (TN), easily a top 5 all-time game for me due to the electricity in the El Donaldson Stadium air that night and Coach Wallace references that.  I mention that specifically to provide the post-game interview following that game.  To me, it typifies Coach Wallace’s passion in one segment.  That game had a lot of juice in it and Coach Wallace was fired up as much as he would let himself be.  LiMu Limo (Short) | LiMu Emu & Doug | Liberty Mutual Insurance Commercial

Great Memory.  Great Game.  Great Coach.  Wish you a Great Retirement Coach!  Always a spot somewhere in the land of Purple and Gold I would think!!!  Just sayin…

The links below are also good ones about Coach Wallace’s retirement and the second one with @JasonFrakes is particularly good and well worth your time.

Bing Videos                         St. Xavier football coach Kevin Wallace previews 2025 KHSAA season - Yahoo Sports

 

Bowling Green hasn’t been 0-2 since 1985. 

Coach Wallace leaves Bowling Green Friday evening a very happy man. No doubt these Purples will be fired up though and it should be a nice crowd even after the opening loss. The defense will have to be the catalyst to this programs success for the year but I’m not sure it’ll be enough to beat a very stout X team. Purples offense will have to go back to the drawing board, not necessarily throwing away the whole gameplan but they don’t have the weapons to exploit matchups they’re notorious for with the injuries they’ve already accumulated. It will be a very difficult test in this matchup to get anything going.

Tigers 28 Purples 10

Great write up like always @Purple88. One little typo I saw was Luka Bentz and Ben Pinkston are returning LB's not O-Line.

I'll go with St. X winning 28-7. Coach Spader in his pre game interview said they were still figuring some things out and needed more attention to detail in practice and that showed up in the game with Owensboro Catholic. BG also had a tough blow when Trevy Barber went out with injury because he's the primary play maker. St. X also should be motivated since they lost to BG last year so I think they will bring their A game.

BG needs some momentum or they could very well start off 0-4. I don’t see them beating X this year though. 
 

X 36

BG 10

Barbers mom just posted on Facebook that there is no break nor dislocation. Great news for that young man, his family and team. An undersized athlete who has been severely overlooked by programs at the next level who undoubtedly needs his SR year to boost his stock. I’m sure he’ll still be out this week and possibly another one, but not nearly as bad as the rumblings I was hearing last night.

https://scoreboard.12dt.com/scoreboard/khsaa/kyfb25/stats_96823_93935485

St. X stat report from Owensboro game. 
 

Held Owensboro to 47 yards rushing. 

3 hours ago, Purple88 said:

As @Brown mentioned, the deep ball was there, but BG didn't look to that IMO, nor did they look for anything over the middle.

Is Travey the deep threat? Because this offensive observation you made is interesting in regards to Jaxon being the QB.

Travey is a deep threat. 

5 hours ago, TheBallCoach said:

Coach Wallace leaves Bowling Green Friday evening a very happy man. No doubt these Purples will be fired up though and it should be a nice crowd even after the opening loss. The defense will have to be the catalyst to this programs success for the year but I’m not sure it’ll be enough to beat a very stout X team. Purples offense will have to go back to the drawing board, not necessarily throwing away the whole gameplan but they don’t have the weapons to exploit matchups they’re notorious for with the injuries they’ve already accumulated. It will be a very difficult test in this matchup to get anything going.

Tigers 28 Purples 10

I’ll be shocked if BG can hold St. X to 28 after allowing OC to score 23. Most years they can hold St. X to 28 but with the purples offense not being able to move the ball like previous yrs I can see St. X putting up more points this go around.

3 minutes ago, Devils Fan said:

I’ll be shocked if BG can hold St. X to 28 after allowing OC to score 23. Most years they can hold St. X to 28 but with the purples offense not being able to move the ball like previous yrs I can see St. X putting up more points this go around.

I still think the Purples defense is sound, some questions in the secondary at times but I don’t believe they’re in disbelief because they let up 23 points last night. Neither side will push the pace offensively, but I do agree a turnover here and there or some quick possessions could definitely inflate the score. However, the Purples defense can turn their opponents over as well which is what led me to the prediction.

21 minutes ago, Devils Fan said:

I’ll be shocked if BG can hold St. X to 28 after allowing OC to score 23. Most years they can hold St. X to 28 but with the purples offense not being able to move the ball like previous yrs I can see St. X putting up more points this go around.

I was being conservative in my 28 prediction but I could see them scoring more. If St. X didn't take out starters against Owensboro they might have scored 50+ but BG defense maybe better than Owensboro's but will have to find out if that's the case this Friday.

45 minutes ago, Tigerpride94 said:

I was being conservative in my 28 prediction but I could see them scoring more. If St. X didn't take out starters against Owensboro they might have scored 50+ but BG defense maybe better than Owensboro's but will have to find out if that's the case this Friday.

Yeah you’re probably right they definitely went conservative on O and BG’s defense is better than O’s but O’s offense to me seems better and could barely get in the red zone let alone score. St. X is a totally different beast than OC. I expect to see BG with some improvements. Just not enough to keep this close. Would be different if this game happened later in the season.

1 hour ago, TheBallCoach said:

I still think the Purples defense is sound, some questions in the secondary at times but I don’t believe they’re in disbelief because they let up 23 points last night. Neither side will push the pace offensively, but I do agree a turnover here and there or some quick possessions could definitely inflate the score. However, the Purples defense can turn their opponents over as well which is what led me to the prediction.

But would they be able to capitalize off the turnover like in previous years? I know it’s still early so I guess we’ll find out soon enough.