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When the Ohio high school football playoffs open this weekend, there’s going to be a few very interesting story lines circulating through Columbiana County. For one, Salem (8-2) will be gearing up to play its first playoff game in school history as the Quakers hit the road for suburban Columbus and Granville (9-1) on Friday in a Division III tilt. For another, Crestview (9-1) and East Palestine (7-3) will do it again on Friday at Crestview High School in a Div. V playoff opener. The Rebels topped the Bulldogs 35-14 back on Oct 2. And Columbiana (8-2) returns to the playoffs for the fifth straight time and will host Shadyside (5-5) in a Div. VI affair on Saturday at Firestone Park. Salem’s road to the playoffs was a tough one as the Quakers had to beat several difficult opponents down the stretch to earn their maiden voyage into the 11th week. “This was always our goal,” Salem coach Mike Kopachy said. “Now that it’s here though, we just don’t want to be happy to be here. We want to make an impact and keep this going.” Kopachy said the kids have been talking about making history for several weeks and would like to continue to do so. Everyone is still remaining grounded though. “We realize that we’re going to have a tough opponent,” Kopachy said. Kopachy said Granville runs a spread style offense which is similar to what Salem runs. The offense is run by former Ohio State quarterback Scott McMullen who serves as an offensive coordinator. “”They’re very comparable to Lakeview,” Kopachy said. The Quakers had thought they were going to be paired with Buckeye Local, but all plans changed on Saturday as the results started coming in. A similar situation happened with Crestview and East Palestine as they waited on Saturday’s games to finish. “I was on the computer pretty late trying to figure it out,” Crestview coach Paul Cusick said. “I was a little surprised we got East Palestine, but that’s the way it goes.” The Rebel coaching staff was busy scouting Gates Mills Hawken on Saturday afternoon when the thought that they might have to play East Palestine seeped into their heads. “By the end of that game, we thought East Palestine was probably going to be it,” Cusick said. East Palestine coach Jeff Sharkey said he started making plans to play Crestview once he knew the Hawken result. “The only thing I didn’t see happening in our region was Villa Angela St. Joes winning and knocking Mineral Ridge out,” Sharkey said. Despite all the chatter which is bound to be caused by this rematch, Sharkey is treating it separately from what happened in the regular season. “Our goal from the beginning of the season was to make the playoffs and our opponent just happens to be Crestview,” Sharkey said. “We’re not trying to get back at them because I think that would imply that we’re mad at them. What we’re trying to do is redeem ourselves. They played very well and we didn’t play very well. It’s a case where we want to prove that we’re not as bad as the way we played that night.” Awaiting the winner of that game might be defending Div. V state champion Youngstown Ursuline if the Irish get past Garfield Heights Trinity. As for Columbiana, the Clippers avoided a nightmare scenario of having to make plans for Symmes Valley to travel more than five hours to Columbiana. “Shadyside was the one team I didn’t think we’d be playing,” Spaite said. “I was scrambling around at 11 o’clock at night trying to find someone with this coach’s number.” Shadyside is only an hour and a half from Columbiana. The Tigers have a decorated playoff record which includes a Div. VI state final appearance in 2006. “They have a great tradition and definitely one of the better schools down there,” Spaite said. “I saw them in 2006 in the championship against Marion Local and they pretty much run the same scheme as then.” Crestview, East Palestine and Columbiana were the only Inter-Tri County League upper tier teams to qualify for the playoffs. In the lower tier, unbeaten McDonald will be hosting Bascom Hopewell-Loudon and Western Reserve will be traveling to unbeaten Norwalk St. Paul on Saturday in Div. VI games. In the All-American Conference, Campbell Memorial, making its first playoff appearance in 10 years, will travel to top-seeded and unbeaten Chagrin Falls in a Div. IV encounter on Saturday. Poland, which lost its season finale to Canfield, will travel to Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary on Friday in a Div. III game. With the points it earned in the Poland win, Canfield earned a home game with Aurora in Div. II on Friday. Howland is the second seed in that same division and will host Medina Highland. Hubbard also will be hosting a game in Div. III on Friday as the Eagles welcome Medina Buckeye. Unbeaten Youngstown Cardinal Mooney earned the top seed in its Div. III region and will host Mogadore Field on Friday. Field was beaten by East Palestine earlier in the season. Steubenville will open tournament play in Div. III at home against Marlington. The winner of that game gets the winner of Salem-Granville.

 

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