The Front Row with MARK NELKE Oct. 13, 2011

There was something unusual — and nice — about watching Lake City and Lewiston play football last Friday night at Lake City.

The game was close.

Lake City won, 31-28, thanks to a couple of defensive stands in the fourth quarter.

But it seems like there’s been an awfully lot of one-sided games in North Idaho this year.

LET’S START at the top.

Coeur d’Alene has outscored its last four opponents 250-32, beating Skyview of Vancouver, Wash., 52-14, Whitney of Rocklin, Calif., 55-6, 4A Sandpoint 88-12 and, after convincing them to play the game and not forfeit, 4A Moscow 55-0.

Now, Coeur d’Alene is obviously very good this year, but Skyview has some athletes, and Whitney came in highly regarded — and both got stomped.

Post Falls led Sandpoint 48-0 at halftime en route to a 48-6 victory.

Lakeland, having its best season since 2007, has one-sided wins over Colville (41-7) and Pullman (49-21).

In the 3A Intermountain League, defending champion Timberlake opened league play by beating Priest River 63-6 and St. Maries 72-12.

In the 1A North Star League, it’s even worse.

Wallace, a 1A Division I team, did not have to play a full game until last Saturday — it’s sixth game of the season. The Miners won their first five games by the 45-point mercy rule.

Lakeside, the other 1A Division I team in the league, notched its first five victories by the mercy rule. Kootenai beat Mullan, a fellow 1A Division II team, 86-40.

And it’s not a case where the Division I teams always beat up on the Division II teams in the North Star League. From 2006-09, Kootenai went undefeated in the league, meaning the Warriors beat both of the larger Division I teams during that stretch.

THERE WAS a time when the games between 5A and 4A teams in North Idaho were usually close.

As recently as two years ago, Sandpoint-Coeur d’Alene games were tightly contested. Three years ago, Sandpoint won 27-7 on Coeur d’Alene’s field.

4A Lakeland has played two of the four teams in the 5A Inland Empire League and has at least been competitive, losing 46-21 to Lake City and 42-14 to Post Falls.

Timberlake has ruled the IML in recent years and figures to do so again this year. Three of the other teams are down this year and the fifth league team, St. Maries, is improved, but had been down for years.

In the most recent enrollment figures available from the Idaho High School Activities Association (an average of two samples taken during the 2008-09 school year), Post Falls was at 1,544.5 students, Lake City 1,512, Lewiston 1,505, Coeur d’Alene 1,441.5, Sandpoint 1,129, Lakeland 820.5 and Moscow 781.5.

And I wouldn’t be surprised if, when this year’s enrollment figures come out, the gap is even wider between the 5A and 4A schools.

This year’s blowouts could be attributed in part to the larger schools having a numbers advantage, and also in part that the 5A teams are all good and Sandpoint and Moscow, in particular, are down.

Let’s hope the 5A vs. 4A mismatches are just a cyclical thing, if for no other reason that the 5A teams need to be able to play the 4A teams to fill out their schedules. If not, the 5A IEL might someday turn into a double round-robin of league games, like the North Star League.

Not that fans around here couldn’t get used to watching Coeur d’Alene, Post Falls and Lake City battle each other twice a year. But they’d rather see it because the teams want to do it that way, not because they have to do it that way.

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com.