Next Fall’s Manitowoc Lincoln High School Football team will be doing some cross-lake traveling early in the season.
Ships varsity football coach Greg Enz tells Seehafer News that his team will be taking the SS Badger across Lake Michigan to Ludington and then traveling south to Muskegon for a week-2 non-conference game.
Enz describes the football team they’ll be playing in late August.
“Mona Shores, Michigan is a suburb if you will of Muskegon and is a similar size school of 1,400 students,” he explained. “They won a state title maybe 3-years ago, made it to the final-4 or state championship a couple of years ago and have been very consistent as a program.”
Enz likens the Sailors of Mona Shores High School to a Bay Port or Fond du Lac as having a rich, recent tradition.
Greg believes it’s good for the Lincoln program and will be the start of a tough stretch of games.
“You schedule this and you don’t know what the schedule is going to look like,” he said. “So we’re going to go from this game to Menasha, and they’ve proven to be a perennially strong program in the state. And then we play Bay Port as a conference crossover game the following week.”
The Mona Shores School District has offered bus transportation to and from Muskegon for the Shipbuilders contingent.
Enz explained, “We want to make sure this is still an experience and more than just a nonconference game.”
He added, both head coaches agreed if it’s going to be just a run of the mill game why are we going to the lengths that we are to do this?
Enz says some of these kids have never been on the Badger and this might be the first major trip for them.
He said Mayor Justin Nickels was kind enough to do a joint meeting to help make this happen and really liked the idea.
Logistics of the trip still have to be worked out for hotels, etc. during the 3-night stay.
Coach Enz explains the plan is to have a home-and-home series with the Muskegon area football program.
Actually, a cross-lake athletic series between Manitowoc Lincoln and Ludington boys soccer began last Fall when the two teams met at Rubick Athletic Field.
