Page 14 Fall Football Preview • Thursday, August 28, 2025 sailor. mnsun. com
ARMSTRONG HAWKS
New faces promise same grit this fall
DOMINIC BISOGNO dominic. bisogno @ apgecm. com
Armstrong football is preparing to follow up a headline-grabbing 2024 season with a group of determined players, all looking to fill big shoes offensively and defensively for the Falcons.
NEGEN’ S TAKE
There will be plenty of change on the field this season for Armstrong, who saw of a large number of key players in key positions graduate in the spring. That fact has not deterred 11-year head coach Jack Negen, who is embracing the ever-returning challenge of piecing together a high school football team.
“ Part of the fun is the challenge of getting a roster figured out,” Negen told the Sun Post.“ That’ s why we do this coaching thing. We’ ve got to put a puzzle together and the puzzle looks a little different this year. We’ ve got some good stuff done this summer, but obviously, it’ s a challenge to figure out how you replace 2800 yards and 30 touchdowns from your running back and a three-year starting quarterback. We don’ t quite know the answer yet, but that’ s part of all this, figuring those things out.”
Any team that loses a multi-year quarterback like Dawson Franke and a Mr. Football-contending running back like Kevon Johnson in the same cycle will have questions going into the season. The good news is that Armstrong will be bringing in a
sizable group of returners from the Class of 2026 that can contribute, including Eli Kuempel to Lucas Wodtke. Similar questions do spread to the defensive side of things, with the likes of Luke Pappas and Avery Oseth departing last summer, but Armstrong football has a tendency to find future stars when replacing those of the past. Calan Pilon is a returning defensive leader of importance, while some players like Jackson Wylie are being moved to the defensive side of the team to help fill gaps. Considering the overall strength of last year’ s defense from the top down, no one should expect it to be easy to score on the Falcons.
For Negen and Armstrong, changes in personnel do not change philosophy. Negen noted that the program is confident and excited for what it can do with players who know the program and each other well.
“ It feels like we have a group to build on returning defensively, so we’ ll have a little more experience there,” Negen said.“ We’ ll probably have quite a few guys going two ways this season. … Across the team, though, these guys are used to how we do things and they know how we achieve our successes.
“ They’ re used to that. We won’ t switch up what we do just because we lost a few guys. We are who we are. … The kids have been in the program and they’ re ready to step up.”
The 2025 season, in which
( SUN PHOTO BY DOMINIC BISOGNO)
Falcons clash amid a offense versus defense scrimmage during one of Armstrong’ s practices in August.
Armstrong will look to improve on last year’ s run to the first round of state, will also see the Falcons play a considerably different spread of teams. After two years playing teams largely from out of the area, Armstrong now joins the likes of Park Center, Cooper, and Spring Lake Park in the new-look Northstar West-Maroon Conference.
Negen noted that the schedule this season does pack a few big challenges, including two matchups against former 6A teams.
“ There’ s some good teams [ in the new schedule ] and we’ ve got two teams who’ ve dropped from 6A, Buffalo and Elk River, to deal with. Those will be interesting games. … It’ s always fun to play a new team. We’ ll rematch with Alexandria after the loss in state to them. We’ ve got a big challenge preparing for Elk River later in the season. To be honest, though, our main challenge this season is being young and as long as we figure that out, we will find ways to make the most of our games.”
PLAYER PERSPECTIVES
There is a clear and crisp message resounding through Armstrong’ s leaders from the class of 2026. Senior Jackson Wylie, newly repositioned as a middle linebacker, was to the point when explaining the goals the Falcons have on and off the field.
“ We’ re focused on bringing the youth up with us this season, getting them on the right page and making sure that everyone understands what we’ re doing,” Wylie said.“ That’ s so important to them being able to grow alongside us. … We try to ignore some of the outside noise and we’ re pretty focused on what we believe and know about our team.”
See ARMSTRONG | PAGE 26
QUICK HITS
Head Coach Jack Negen 11th Season
Last Year’ s Record: 10-1
Key Returning Players
Armstrong’ s class of 2025 featured some serious all-stars, but the class of 2026 is pulling no punches with a stacked list of players from the class of 2026 that are sure to impress this season. There is a spot to fill at quarterback, but some candidates, like senior Gabe Hall( QB, 2026), bring some experience at the varsity level that could be absolutely key. Eli Kuempel( WR / TE, 2026) and Lucas Wodtke( WR / LS, 2026) are among the list of targets that will also need to come up big.
Defensive returners like Calan Pilon( LB / TE, 2026), Everett Daly( NG, 2026), and the recently-converted Jackson Wylie( LB / RB, 2026) will provide lines of experience throughout an Armstrong defense that was hard to break all through 2024, even in their eventual state tournament loss to Alexandria.
Schedule
Aug. 28: @ Burnsville Sept. 5: Park Center Sept. 12: @ Irondale Sept. 19: Buffalo Sept. 26: @ Spring Lake Park Oct. 3: Elk River Oct. 10: @ Cooper Oct. 15: Alexandria
Game times 7 p. m. unless otherwise noted