A year ago, Northwestern and North Schuylkill played for the Eastern Conference Championship, with the Tigers picking up the trophy by virtue of a 19-18 win. This season, the two teams meet again, but this time the trophy up for grabs is the District 11 Championship, something that both teams have had their eye since the end of last year's meeting between the two teams.

"It was a good match-up last year and it's going to be a good match-up this year," predicted North Schuylkill coach Wally Hall. "The kids on both sides have matured, gotten faster, gotten bigger and obviously, both teams have been better than they were last year, so it's going to be a battle."

Both teams returned a number of players from last year's squad, so the memories of last year's game are still pretty vivid for both teams. While both schools are focused on the district championship, North Schuylkill would like to gain a little revenge to go along with the shiny district trophy and the trip to states that comes with it. Northwestern is looking one game at a time, just like it has all season long.

"We were both kind of young teams last year," said Tiger senior Cam Richardson. "They're a good team and have some really good athletes and they proved that last year in the Eastern Conference. They came down here last year and we're going up there this year. It's going to be fun times and I know both teams are going to be pretty excited."

Northwestern coach Josh Snyder has stressed to his team that it needs to focus on just one game at a time and if it does that, good things would happen. Actually, a lot of good things have happened and Snyder finds himself coaching a team that is breaking many of the school records that were previously held by teams that he played on.

"We're taking it like any other game, just a lot more on the line, but they really play loose," said Snyder of his team. "Even when we play a little sloppy, they're always in control, they never press and someone's going to make a play eventually and they always pull through, so I'm proud of them."

The two teams are very close statistically, with the Tigers having outscored their opponents 459-132 this season, while the Spartans of North Schuylkill have outscored their opponents 460-100. Teams don't get too much closer than that.

Snyder didn't realize it after last year's Eastern Conference playoffs, but as the season has progressed, he's realized that it makes perfect sense for the two teams to meet for this season's district title, since they both returned a number of players on both sides of the ball. Last year, the Spartans had to travel and this season, it's the Tigers making the long trek to Ashland to play North Schuylkill, which makes things just a little tougher for Northwestern.

"I guess we've been on a collision course this season," said Snyder about the two teams. "We've had higher expectations this season and so have they, so it makes sense for us to be playing each other."