American Fork is heading to California to play Mater Dei in Week 2 while Lone Peak hosts two national powerhouse programs. First, IMG Academy from Florida plays the Knights in Week 2 and in Week 4 Lone Peak also hosts Bishop Gorman out of Las Vegas. Their game with Bishop Gorman last year ended in a Lone Peak forfeit when too many of their players left the sideline during a skirmish in the third quarter (a specific rule for Nevada prep football).

Skyridge hosts Hun, New Jersey in Week 2 and travels to Las Vegas to take on Liberty. Lehi has back-to-back home games in Week 3 and Week 4 against St. James Performance Academy out of Virginia and American Leadership Academy out of Arizona. Westlake goes out to California again to play Rancho Bernardo.

Maple Mountain  –with BYU commit Uhila Wolfgramm at defensive end — makes a trip to southern California to play South Pasadena on Aug. 28. Though it isn’t necessarily a game of powerhouse programs per se, Spanish Fork’s American Leadership Academy visits White Pine High School in Ely, Nevada, also in Aug. 28.

The improved quality of Utah prep football has indeed caught the attention of many powerhouse programs. After taking state, Corner Canyon was invited to take part in the inaugural Overtime National Championship game where they were defeated 37-20 by Saint Frances, Maryland.

Provo has a very auspicious schedule to open up the season. In back-to-back weeks, the Bulldogs play the two 4A semifinalists that were on opposite side of the Bulldogs last year when they visit Green Canyon in Week 1 and host Crimson Cliffs in Week 2. Provo hits the road to take on 5A runner-up Springville the following week. The Bulldogs head south again to open up league play against Salem Hills and don’t be shocked if the winner of this game wins Region 8.

Who’s on top?

As I have done for years, last season’s top team in the Power Poll stays there until knocked off.

Ridgeline won the Class 4A title, ending up at No. 1 in the final Preece Power Poll of 2025 and the RiverHawks will take into the 2026 season the longest winning streak at 14 games. 3A champ Cedar City is next with a 13-game winning streak. Orem won 11 straight games when the Tigers nailed down the 5A state title. Their last loss was to Rocky Mountain, Idaho by a 39-37 score in week 3 of last season.

Orem will have a challenging opening game as they travel to take on Kamehameha, Hawaii, which is actually located on the Big Island. After Kamehameha, it doesn’t get any easier as the Tigers visit 6A Skyridge then hosts Mater Dei, a national powerhouse out of California. In Week 4, Orem starts league play with a trip to Springville in a rematch of the 5A championship game.

In regards to futility, Ben Lomond leads the state with a 21-game losing streak while Cottonwood has a 19-game losing skid. Grand County has lost 17 straight and petitioned the UHSAA to play 8-man football but will be ineligible for the state playoffs. Other lengthy losing streaks include Monument Valley (16), Bonneville (13), Deseret Peak (10), North Sevier (10) and Kearns (9). In regards to the county, no program is too deep in the mire though Maple Mountain and Cedar Valley have lost five and four games in a row, respectively.

New on the block

Utah added only one school this upcoming school year and it is Deer Creek in Heber. Its mascot will be the Riverhawks, the same exact mascot as Ridgeline. The Cache Valley school has an odd way to spell it, going with RiverHawks (all one word but two capital letters). With its opening, Wasatch will move down to 4A and the Riverhawks will also compete in 4A in Region 8 with Utah Valley schools Mountain View, Provo, Salem Hills and Timpanogos, then add in Park City and Uintah (out in Vernal) as well. Deer Creek will open up its season at home against Mountain Crest.

The two campuses of Deer Creek and Wasatch are actually pretty close together, much like Green Canyon is to Sky View in Cache County. There will be a general east side-west side split with the west side of the valley going to Deer Creek generally and the east side going to Wasatch. The boundaries of the two schools and feeder middle schools didn’t exactly get drawn without fuss as the local school board vote was just 3-2. But hopefully this split will be a bit friendlier than the Provo-Timpview situation which has seen some ugliness over the decades. Provo and Timpview will not meet each other on the gridiron for the third straight season but Deer Creek and Wasatch will play in Week 4, the league opener for both schools.

Rookies on the sideline

Seven new head coaches will patrol the sidelines this year in Utah County programs including Joe Dupaix (ALA), Cody Gardner (Cedar Valley), Andy Stokes (Orem), Mike Cole (Payson), Viliami Halasima (Provo), Brock Condie (Spanish Fork), and Nolan Nielsen (Timpanogos). Stokes had previous head coaching experience at Dixie and Timpview while Dupaix was a head coach at Timpanogos in 2014 and had two stints at Southern Virginia University. Cole, Condie, and Halasima have been longtime assistants at their programs though Condie did take the year off last season.

Harry Schwenke of Maple Mountain and Andy Hadfield of Lehi are just in their second year, though Schwenke was previously head coach at Salem Hills. Aaron Behm is the longest tenured head coach now beginning his 18th season at American Fork. Bart Brockbank of Lone Peak enters his 11th year leading the Knight program.

Corner Canyon will begin a new era with Casey Sutera taking over for Eric Kjar, who left to be the head coach at Weber State University. Sutera was the head coach at Brighton and he had good success there going 35-14 in his five years as head coach. The Bengals also made two straight semifinal appearances in 2024 and 2025 so the Chargers seem to be in capable hands.

Corner Canyon has won the last three 6A state titles and San Juan goes for five in a row in 2A. Other than that, last year’s state champions were all brand new from the year before.

Where there is strength

There is no doubt that northern Utah County and southern Salt Lake County are the epicenter of football in the Beehive State. On the Utah County side, American Fork, Lehi, Lone Peak and Skyridge are strong programs and Westlake looks to have a breakout year. Just over the Point of the Mountain you have Herriman and Mountain Ridge to the west and up against the mountain to the east is Corner Canyon. Bingham has been a powerhouse in the past though the Miners have tapered off the past few years. Jordan and Alta have won state titles in relatively recent times. No doubt that the creation of Corner Canyon in 2013 hurt the Alta and Jordan athletic programs, and before coming to Corner Canyon, Eric Kjar led Jordan to one state title in 2012 then Corner Canyon to six more.

Since 6A was created in 2017, only four different schools have won titles and its Corner Canyon with five, Lone Peak with two, while Bingham and Skyridge have each won one state title.

In 5A football, Utah County has shown its dominance as well. Lehi won three state titles in 2017, 2021 and 2022. Since 2017, Orem has won five state titles (two in 4A) while Timpview has taken home the gold trophy once. Since 2018, there has been a Utah County team in every 6A championship game. And a Utah County team has appeared in every 5A state title game since 2014 with the exception of 2024 where Bountiful beat Roy for the title.