Game Day 5 - #2 Mishawaka Marian - #15 NorthWood

Both teams move up in the State rankings. Marian moves up a notch from 3 to 2 while the Panthers move from 19th to 15th. Both teams have had a good start of the season. Marian, State Runner Up last year, fields a team with mainly seniors. Like NorthWood, they lost 6 starters from last year's squad. The JV game squares off at 5 pm, the Varsity at 7 pm. The bus leaves at 4 pm from Wellfield. Players need to park in the west part of the car park. Wes Bell received stitches Saturday night after colliding with a Manchester player and we are awaiting clearance from NW Sports Medicine. Dom is not available until Thursday. Marian knocked the Panthers out of Regionals last season (1-0) and ended up losing in the State Final. Marian is 2-0 on the season, beating west Noble (2-0) and Concord (2-1). The top 20 2A teams are a majority private schools like Marian (15) while private schools account for just 5 (with NW being the 3rd highest ranking public school in 2A). A case could be made to have private schools just having their own class but so far the IHSAA has not shown signs of even entertaining that idea.