Horsemen to test Titans Friday

Plains Horsemen football coach Eddie Fultz is trying to stay in the here and now. In this peculiar year of history named 2020, staying optimistic in the present is proving to be a challenge.

“I’m urging our kids to stay in the moment,” Fultz told the Ledger Tuesday “The year 2020 is going to be the year of hindsight. It’s going to be easy to tell what we should have done once it is over; but we have to go through the front end of it first. And that could prove to be a challenge.”

COVID-19 restrictions or not, the Horsemen are scheduled to start their season this Friday night at 7 p.m. in Philipsburg against the Flint Creek Titans, the 8-man co-operative formed from players in Drummond and P-burg.

Coach Mike Cutler’s Titans were an 8-Man playoff team last year and will again be led by the coach’s son Cade Cutler, who has signed to play football for Montana State once his prep playing days are through. Fultz and his Horsemen finished just short of making the playoffs with a 4-4 record last fall.

Flint Creek won the 2017 and 2018 Montana State 8-Man titles before Fairview busted through to win last year.

“Flint Creek will be good, but I don’t think they will be as good as those ’17 and ’18 teams were,” Fultz said. “The west was actually looking a lot more competitive coming into this year.”

Fultz said he lost four Horsemen, all potential starters, to transfer before the school year even started this past week. “We were looking pretty good at the end of the season last year,” he said. “Other coaches were telling me that they thought we would be one of the top teams in the west, and then we lose four starters to transfer.”

Still, Fultz does have 19 players out for the team and expects to field a competitive squad, depending, of course, what happens with COVID-19 during this year of hindsight.

“It will be interesting to see what happens,” he said, “to see how many games get played. We could end up with a bunch of cancellations and teams ending up with a different number of games played. Figuring out who makes the playoffs could be tricky at the end of the season.”

Seniors Tristan Subatch, Clayton Hill, Gavin Regaldo, Brayden Good, Tucker Foster and Duncan Chisholm, juniors Kody Carter and Sam Wood, sophomores Gary Bradley, Garth Parker and Mason Elliott and freshmen Devin Barnes, Nick Hill, Drew Carey, Denny Black, Hunter Higardera, Will Tatum and Donny Nelson comprise the current roster for the 2020 Horsemen.