Mike Kraft/MDN Minot North quarter Brayden Blikre has accounted for 720 total yards and 14 touchdowns through seven games this season.

Minot North has had the luxury throughout the season of playing mostly stress-free fourth quarters of football.

In fact, the Sentinels had scored just three points in the fourth quarter all year entering their game against Devils Lake last week because the result was already well in hand. In their first six games, the Sentinels entered the fourth quarter leading by an average margin of 30.3 points, never in front by fewer than two possessions.

All of that got flipped on its head last week against the Firebirds. The Sentinels led 19-7 entering the fourth quarter and pushed their advantage to 19 points with 9:35 remaining in regulation before Devils Lake mounted a furious rally. In a blink of an eye, the Firebirds were within 26-20 and inside the Minot North 10 with less than a minute left looking to steal a victory. But Minot North’s defense came up with a fourth-down stop near the goal line to escape by the skin of its teeth.

But at the end of the day, a win is a win for the Sentinels. As a result, they sit atop the Class AA West Region standings and are one win away from having home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. Still, there are lessons to be learned, even in victory.

“From an offensive perspective, we have to get a little bit more diverse,” Minot North Jacob Holmen said. “I’ve said that multiple times this year, but it catches up with you when you play good teams like Devils Lake. Being able to still run the ball but then spread it out and attack all areas of the field, that’s an important part of what we want to do offensively and we kind of got away from that. It’s a big learning game for myself, too. As a second-year guy, I haven’t called a lot of closely contested games like that one down the stretch. I shared that with our kids that I need to get better and as a team we need to get better, but at the end of the day you walk off the field with a win. Regardless of what it looks like, you’re going to take it.”

The Sentinels (7-0 overall, 3-0 WDA) ran the ball 54 times for 259 yards, led by Cooper Chick, who finished with 142 yards and 21 carries. Quarterback Brayden Blikre went 5-for-8 for 81 yards and a touchdown.

The Minot North defense was its usually stingy selves through three quarters, creating a pair of turnovers, but surrendered big chunk plays to Devils Lake’s passing game down the stretch. While the Sentinels limited the Firebirds to 77 yards rushing, Devils Lake quarterback Mason Palmer completed 21 of 30 passes for 338 yards and three touchdowns.

“We know there are things we have to improve at,” Holmen said. “We have to finish games better. We were up by two scores and had chances to put them away and just didn’t, so that’s a learning thing too of keeping your foot on the gas and finish games. That was a big point of emphasis when we got back together was finishing better and they’ve taken that to heart and hopefully we can learn from that as we go forward.”

The Sentinels will have to put last week’s game in the rearview mirror even quicker than most weeks, as it’s a short week for some with a handful of games being played on Thursday night instead of the traditional Friday night due to an administrators convention that has students off from school both Thursday and Friday. This week is Senior Night for Minot North as it welcomes Jamestown to town for the final regular season game at Sentinel Stadium this season. A win against the Blue Jays would ensure the West Region regular season title and home-field advantage throughout the playoffs.

“I haven’t told our kids that, but they have probably figured that out on their own,” Holmen said of what’s at stake. “We want to treat it like any other game. We’re just going in and playing like it’s any other week. Our next game is always our biggest game of the year, so we’re just trying to preach that regardless of who our opponent is. It’s us vs. us, where we can’t shoot ourselves in the foot like we did sometimes last week.”

Unlike its last two opponents in Devils Lake and Watford City – which currently occupy the No. 2 and No. 3 spots in the conference and the only other teams in the West Region with a winning record – the Blue Jays (1-6, 0-3) enter Thursday’s contest having had a difficult season to date. They have lost six straight since a win against Wahpeton to open their season. The losing streak is Jamestown’s longest since 2019, which was also the last year the team finished with a losing record.

Starting quarterback Brady Nenow broke his foot two games into the season, leaving sophomore Karson Schmidt to handle signal calling duties. He has filled in admirably, completing 71 passes for 759 yards and five touchdowns, but has thrown 11 interceptions.

The Blue Jays’ primary offensive weapon is running back Liam Frey. The senior tailback has amassed 769 yards and 10 touchdowns on 130 carries this season, averaging 109 yards per game. His best performance came against Devils Lake earlier this season when he rushed for 218 yards and three touchdowns on 18 carries.

“Offensively, their biggest weapon is their running back,” Holmen said. “He’s a big, 205-pound kid who runs really well. We’ll have to tackle well. Missed tackles can turn into big plays when he has the ball in his hands.”

The Blue Jays average 18 points per game and allow a conference-worst 33.9 points per game. Meanwhile, the Sentinels score at a clip of 34.1 points per game while allowing just 6.9 points per game, both tops in the West Region. But Holmen said his team will not be overlooking the Blue Jays this week despite their record or statistics.

“We have a lot of respect for Jamestown and for what coach (Bill) Nelson does with his program. They buy into the weight room and are strong kids and they run well. We don’t read into records and we tell our kids not to compare records, not to score compare. It’s a quality team coming up and they are very well coached. And we’re really familiar with them. We’ve played them several times, especially in our early years as a program. We actually played them twice in one year. We know their kids pretty well. We know we’re going to get their best shot.”

With two weeks left in the season, Kindred is the lone team from Class AA to have clinched a spot in the postseason. Several teams, including Minot North, can join the Vikings with a win this week.

Kickoff is scheduled for 7 p.m.