High school football: Devils, Dons renew fierce rivalry

On one hand, Friday's rivalry showdown between Spanish Fork and Springville isn't a make-or-break game for either team.

"We're not trying to build this up as the Super Bowl," said Spanish Fork coach Matt Christensen.

But on the other hand, it promises to be quite the entertaining affair.

Springville (6-1, 3-0 in Region 8) will make the short bus ride to Spanish Fork High to take on Spanish Fork (5-1, 2-0) at 7 p.m. Friday in what will be the 83rd meeting between the two schools.

Bragging rights will not only be on the line in a series that Springville narrowly leads 40-39-3, but the Region 8 title will arguably also be on the line between the two current league-leaders as both squads will hope to extend their impressive starts to the 2009 season.

Add to that the fact that a mammoth crowd from the southern half of Utah County is expected to fill Spanish Fork's stadium, and there are plenty of things to be excited about.

Because of an unexpected scheduling conflict, Spanish Fork and Springville actually didn't meet last fall, but they'll look to add another exciting chapter to their long rivalry on Friday after the one-year hiatus.

"It's just a big rivalry," said Christensen, who participated in Spanish Fork-Springville games as a Spanish Fork player before he became a coach. "Back before Salem and Mapleton (had schools), it was always Payson and Springville were the two big rivalry games. They were the fun games to go to. You got big crowds for those.

"We went up to 5A for a while, so it kind of lost its feeling a little bit, but now that we're back (in 4A), I think it's good for the region and it's a lot of fun."

Christensen knows his guys will have their hands full on Friday against a very balanced bunch from Springville. To have a chance, he said his guys will have to play smart football from start to finish.

"Springville's well-coached. They're an aggressive team. They're a physical team," said Christensen. "They're gonna be well-coached, and when you play a team like that, you have to take care of the ball, you have to take care of your assignments and everyone just has to do their jobs."

Christensen will undoubtedly hope that QB Hayden Nielsen can lead the way in that regard. Nielsen has thrown for 1,221 yards and 18 TDs this fall, and he'll lead the way for his solid supporting cast to follow behind on Friday.

TOP 25 WATCH: For the first time this fall, the upper portion of the Deseret News Top 25 rankings remained unchanged from one week to the next.

Following Week 7 of the season, the top six teams — No. 1 Bingham, No. 2 Pleasant Grove, No. 3 Bountiful, No. 4 Brighton, No. 5 Alta and No. 6 Mountain Crest all retained their spots in the rankings.

Viewmont, which edged archrival Davis, was the week's biggest climber, as the Vikes went from being unranked to No. 18. On the other hand, Riverton, which was beaten soundly by Alta, fell from 14th to 21st.

e-mail: drasmussen@desnews.com