The Front Row with JASON ELLIOTT August 29, 2012

There is something to be said about football in the month of August.

Unless you're playing in the Arena Football League - wins don't guarantee a title.

But it is a start.

WHEN THE high school season opened on "zero week" on Friday night, both the Coeur d'Alene Vikings and Lake City Timberwolves took on the test of riding on a bus to the Treasure Valley and take on teams from the Boise area.

Coeur d'Alene took on Skyview of Nampa, winning the game 40-36 on a late touchdown run by Marques Mort, set up by a blocked punt. Lake City traveled to Eagle to face the Mustangs - the same team that defeated them in the state 5A playoffs last November.

Tied after three quarters, Eagle outscored Lake City 14-7 in the final quarter to win 35-28, a way different total than the 58-7 final in the playoffs.

Both teams lost key players from 2011, so the road back to the playoffs won't get any easier, even if there's still a ton of talent on both teams.

For those guys unfamiliar with traveling on a bus and playing later that night, at least that lesson was learned early on.

The best indication of how good both will be will come the weekend of Sept. 15, when both take on teams from Washington in the Kibbie Dome during the Idaho Football Classic.

In a pair of 8-man football games in the Kibbie Dome on Saturday, both Mullan and Clark Fork, who finished near the bottom of the North Star League last year, came up with wins.

Mullan, who only one once last year - at Clark Fork - defeated Timberline of Weippe 44-26 and Clark Fork beat Lewis County 44-8. The teams will face off Friday in Clark Fork in a key Division II game.

DON'T BE fooled by the 3-0 start to the preseason for the Seattle Seahawks.

In the past three weeks, they've beaten Tennessee at home and both Denver and Kansas City on the road and for the most part - it has been second-string players doing most the damage.

Rookie Russell Wilson, who wasn’t expected to start this season, will get the nod after beating out Matt Flynn during the preseason.

Terrell Owens, who the team brought in to compete for a starting wide receiver spot, was released on Sunday and the team’s starting quarterback from 2011, Tarvaris Jackson, was traded to Buffalo after not playing in a game this year.

By the time that Thursday’s game between Oakland and Seattle concludes, the practices will be over and the games will start meaning a lot more.

Also that night, Post Falls and the Idaho football team, among others, will kick off their football seasons, opening optimism that this could be the year.

At least by then, it will be a start.

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for the Coeur d’Alene Press. He can be reached by telephone at 664-8176, Ext. 2020 or via email at jelliott@cdapress.com.