Greenwood preparing for season-opening clash at Bentonville West

BY DUDLEY E. DAWSON

A Greenwood program that always has a goal of playing the last Class 6A game of the season will play its first 2024 one on Friday against at a tough Class 7A foe.

The Bulldogs, off a 13-0 campaign and state title last season under head coach Chris Young, will travel to Centerton to face Bentonville West in a 7 p.m. contest.

Greenwood returns 7 starters on offense and 3 on defense from a squad that had the schools fifth unbeaten season and won its 11th state title since 2000.

Bentonville West has 13 starters returning, 7 on offense, from a 7-4 campaign.

“Offseason is long with the summer and fall camp and the fact that we are at game and now that it is game week, there is a sense of excitement you can’t duplicate with football starting up,” Young said. “…Our kids are all fired up and they are ready to go play a really good Bentonville West team.”

Greenwood is expected to be a contender for yet another state title this season.

“As high as expectations are with other people, ours are even higher,” Young said. “We expect to be at our best every week and we really don’t focus on who we are playing, we try to focus on ourselves. We have done that for a long time and it has really helped our program.”

Greenwood topped defending Class 7A state champion Fayetteville 41-21 in a scrimmage on Aug. 20.

“We were happy with our scrimmage,” Young said. “We were sloppy, but I think we overcame some things and showed a little bit of resiliency when we had some adversity and think that was good. Just proud of them and ready to play a real game.

Greenwood’s offense is led by highly-recruited junior quarterback Kane Archer and prolific senior wide receiver Grant Karnes, who had 72 catches for 990 yards and 13 touchdowns last season.

Archer, who passed for 2,352 yards and 32 touchdown last season, has offers from Arkansas, Michigan, Ole Miss, Texas A&M and others.

“Having Kane back helps tremendously and he has had a great camp.” Young said. “He’s had a two years in the offense and this will be his third with the varsity level so we are excited about that. I think you will see him take his game to the another level.”

He has several receiving targets to go along with Karnes in Isaiah Arrington (38 catches, 582 yards, 9 TDs), Nebraska move in Champ Davis, who has an offer from the Cornhuskers, and others.

“I feel like we have a really deep group of receivers, not only our starting four, but we huge got three or four others we feel really comfortable playing,” Young said. “We are going to play a lot of guys and we think competition makes everybody better so when guys are out there competing for reps, I think it just improves us overall.”

The running game is a work in progress per Young.

“That is a question mark,” Young said. “We have four offensive linemen back that started last year, but don’t have a running back that started. We have four guys really competing right now for reps.”

Senior defensive end/linebacker Cash Archer, Kane’s older brother who is also drawing interest from Arkansas, linebacker Paul Brixey and safety Kaylor Jasna head up the defense.

“Defensively, we lost a lot of guys, but we have a lot of good ones back and have some program guys that have been around our program for six years now and haven’t started before. But we think they are ready to have breakout seasons.

“…Having Cash back is great because he can put pressure on team whether he is on edge or at middle linebacker, where he will be more at this year.”

Photo by John D. James