There's games, but you'll have to travel

It's one of those quirks in the schedule - but for the second time in the first three weeks of the season, there are no Friday night high school football games scheduled for the Coeur d'Alene area.

Coeur d'Alene High doesn't play until Saturday, Lake City is idle and Post Falls is at Sandpoint. The closest game might be Lakeland at East Valley.

Post Falls (0-1) at Sandpoint (0-1): In the wake of last week's 27-17 season-opening loss to Graham-Kapowsin of Graham, Wash., Post Falls coach Jeff Hinz stressed the need to be more consistent on both sides of the ball this week.

“We made some mistakes, and we need to clean them up,” Hinz said. “They realize they can’t take downs off (mentally); they’ve got to play all four quarters.

But “our kids played extremely, extremely hard,” he added. “They went for four quarters the best they can against a physical team, and tried to give some of that back.”

Sandpoint, coming off a 1-8 season last year, opened last week with a 42-14 loss to East Valley.

Post Falls has won six straight games over Sandpoint, after Sandpoint won the previous eight.

Mercer Island (1-0) at Coeur d’Alene (2-0): Mercer Island is a 3A school — Washington’s second-highest classification. The Islanders lost in the first round of the state playoffs last year.

Mercer Island opened last week with a 35-20 victory at home over 4A Redmond. Mercer Island quarterback Brian Higgins threw two touchdown passes and ran for two more.

“They run some similar stuff that we run on offense,” Coeur d’Alene coach Shawn Amos said. “They run the spread, and they run their quarterback a little bit.”

Lakeland (0-1) at East Valley (1-0): Five turnovers stalled Lakeland last week in a season-opening 20-7 loss at Lewiston.

Adam Talley rushed for 193 yards on 12 carries last week for East Valley.

Lakeland won last year’s matchup 31-17 at home.

Timberlake (1-0) vs. Grangeville (2-0): Timberlake is 3A and Grangeville is 2A, but Grangeville is one of the top teams in District 2, regardless of classification.

Grangeville handled 4A Moscow 38-10 in its season opener, then hammered 3A Kellogg 69-6 last week.

Wallace (1-1) at Lakeside (0-1): Wallace beat Kootenai 52-6 in the opener. Kootenai then beat Lakeside 52-6 last week. Wallace lost 54-22 to Cusick (Wash.) last week.

Kootenai (1-1) at Lacrosse-Washtucna, Wash. (0-1): LaCrosse-Washtucna lost 44-20 to Odessa-Harrington in its opener last week.

Kootenai lost 42-14 to Lac-Wash at home last year.

Lake City (0-1-1) returns to action Sept. 15 vs. W.F. West of Chehalis, Wash., at the Idaho Football Classic at the Kibbie Dome in Moscow.

St. Maries (1-1) is idle, then plays host to Deer Park next Friday.

Friday’s Games

Post Falls at Sandpoint, 7 p.m.

Lakeland at East Valley, 7 p.m.

Wallace at Lakeside, 7 p.m.

Kootenai at LaCrosse-Washtucna (Wash.), 7 p.m.

Timberlake at Grangeville, 7:30 p.m.

Saturday’s Game

Mercer Island (Wash.) at Coeur d’Alene, 2 p.m.