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Fans cheer on their team with Mount Timpanogos looming in the background during the non-region game against Olympus at Provo on Friday, Aug. 23, 2024.

Brian E. Preece, Herald correspondent

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Lone Peak High School football players prepare to take the field for a game against Orem High School in Highland, Utah, on Friday, September 11, 2020. (Jay Drowns, Special to the Herald)

Jay Drowns

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A play unfolds during a playoff game between the Salem Hills Skyhawks and the Payson Lions on Tuesday, Oct. 24, 2017 at Salem Hills High School. Isaac Hale, Daily Herald

Isaac Hale, Daily Herald

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One thing that is great about Utah high school football is the beautiful settings of so many stadiums.

In the late summer and early fall, and with most of the games starting at 7 p.m., fans often get treated to beautiful sunsets. Then of course there are the incredible views of the mountains, or in other cases, great views of the valley and Utah Lake. Many fields feature views of the nearby temples of the Church of Jesus Christ as Latter-Day Saints as if the school architects knew exactly what they were doing.

Provo High’s newer campus on the west side of Provo provides all those elements. Its rival sister school Timpview gives a breathtaking view of Utah Lake as well as Mount Timpanogos to the north. With the case of rivals American Fork and Lone Peak, the Mount Timpanogos temple is a dominant feature. In American Fork’s case the fans can see the temple to the north and west with the background of the mountains, while Lone Peak’s fans look south with Utah Lake in the distance. Every campus in Utah County has a great setting in regard to the scenery.

Outside the valley, Skyline High school fans enjoy seeing the northwest rocky face of Mount Olympus like it’s in arm’s reach. Go south to schools in St. George, Kanab or Moab and the scenic red rock dominates. Even West High School in downtown Salt Lake has a unique setting. In its former days, the field was surrounded by buildings on three sides and the scoreboard was on the roof of the building over the south end zone. Even with its remodel, there is a unique urban feeling with the State Capitol building, along with Ensign Peak, off in the distance.

Legendary college football announcer Keith Jackson once remarked that he felt that the setting for BYU’s LaVell Edwards Stadium was the most beautiful one in college football.

So even if your team is on the short end of the scoreboard, maybe take a moment and look around. There is just so much physical beauty in the Beehive State, and especially right here in Utah Valley.

Maple Mountain bests rival Spanish Fork: For the second season in a row Maple Mountain comes out on top in the battle of Spanish Fork city.

Last year Maple Mountain won the contest on the game’s final play but this year built up a 22-point lead and then held on after Spanish Fork scored the final 14 points to win 35-27.

Both teams featured two of the best running backs in the state.

Eli Mauga for Maple Mountain ran for 108 yards on 17 carries with two touchdowns while Spanish Fork’s Kaden Vest had 101 yards on 15 carries. Maple Mountain’s Easton Kojima, who played at Spanish Fork last year, had eight carries with 53 yards as the Golden Eagles had 185 yards rushing as a team.

Both quarterbacks played well as Maple Mountain’s Mason Jensen was 16-for-21 for 225 yards with three touchdowns, while Spanish Fork’s McKay Smith was 18-for-30 for 230 yards and one touchdown.

The razor’s edge between winning and losing: Lone Peak did what Skyridge couldn’t the previous week, and that was to stop Timpview just short of the goal line in the final moments of the game.

Lone Peak’s defense came up big again. The Knights didn’t have any interception returns for touchdowns this game but Jayson Mayberry had two picks and now has three on the season. He also had a 45-yard scoring reception as a receiver.

Kannon Huntsman and Nicholas Marble help ALA light up the scoreboard: Though ALA hasn’t won a lot of games in recent years, it does have some dynamic athletes that bring excitement to their faithful.

Huntsman scored four times with three touchdowns receiving and then a 75-yard fumble return to help the Eagles defeat Parowan 42-7 after actually overcoming a 7-6 deficit at halftime. Marble had five touchdowns passing. Though the season is just two games old, Huntsman has seven touchdowns (five receiving, one running, one fumble return) while Marble has thrown nine touchdown passes.

Bounce-back victories: Besides ALA, Mountain View, Payson, Salem Hills, Skyridge and Wasatch were victorious after dropping their season openers.

Mountain View blanked Ben Lomond 49-0 after staking itself out to a 36-0 halftime lead. Dexton Havea had 16 carries for 147 yards and four touchdowns while sophomore quarterback Hyrum Stafford had two touchdown passes.

Payson went on the road and blitzed Hillcrest 42-7. Logan Russell had a busy night for the Lions with two touchdowns receiving and kicking an 18-yard field goal.

Jedi Nelson tossed three touchdowns while his Skyhawk teammate Brenner Nielson had a 20-yard pick six as Salem Hills crushed Cottonwood, 48-10.

Kanael Sweetwyne had four touchdowns passing as Skyridge defeated Liberty, Nevada 41-26.

And after Wasatch was shut out last week by Park City 17-0, Wasatch posted its own shutout of Cyprus, 49-0. Mack Nelson had two touchdown passes to lead the Wasp attack.

Statistical superlatives: Quarterback Easton Leavitt accounted for six Red Devil touchdowns as Springville overcame an early 15-0 deficit to take down visiting Bonneville, 48-35. Lehi’s Jett Niu tossed three touchdowns, all to Mays Madsen, as Lehi blanked Desert Hills 35-0. Feleti Iongi had three touchdowns for Orem as the Tigers downed American Fork 32-26. Gage Cline kicked two field goals, one from 42-yards for American Fork in a losing cause.

Big Game of the Week No. 1: Corner Canyon, the returning 6A state champions, will visit Lone Peak. Corner Canyon shocked the national football world when they beat IMG Academy of Florida 35-34 last week. IMG Academy was ranked as high as No. 3 nationally, while the Chargers should move up from their own No. 18 ranking. But Lone Peak is 2-0 and won’t be intimidated as the Knights beat Corner Canyon to win the 2021 6A state title. This is a classic battle of great offense vs. great defense though the Chargers are understandably the favorites.

Big Game of the Week No. 2: Cedar Valley will host rival Westlake. Last year, the Aviators won by a single point and come into this game with a 2-0 record. With an 0-2 mark to start the season, Westlake will be desperate for a victory because the Thunder faithful know things won’t get any easier when the 6A Region 3 schedule starts. Westlake needs to conjure up more offense after being shut out by Alta last week 24-0. So far the Thunder have scored only 16 points in their two games. With a win, Cedar Valley would start 3-0 for the first time in school history.

Big Game of the Week No. 3: Though Provo hasn’t beat Timpview since 1989 (not counting a Timpview win that was vacated about a decade ago), the Bulldog faithful remain hopeful that this year might be the year. Timpview is at home, like actually playing at home, versus at Provo High as its home like last year. The Thunderbirds, needless to say, want to avoid the epic upset.

Extra points: Richfield will put its state leading 15-game winning streak on the line when they visit Payson … Cedar Valley, Lehi, Lone Peak, Maple Mountain, Orem, and Springville remain undefeated while American Fork, Pleasant Grove, Provo, Utah Military Academy-Camp Williams and Westlake are still looking for their first win … Some of these smaller schools can really play ball. For example, 1A Beaver shut out 3A Grantsville 35-0 and actually was ahead by that score at halftime. This is after Grantsville snapped 2A San Juan’s winning streak at 36 games to open the season. Meanwhile, 3A Morgan blanked 4A Sky View 34-0, the same Sky View team that beat Salem Hills 28-21 in week one. In its previous game, the Trojans beat the returning 4A state champs Crismon Cliffs, 41-13. And to give this victory more context, 6A Bingham beat Crimson Cliffs by just a 17-7 clip … Taking out the intra-county contests, Utah County schools were 8-5 last week and now are 15-13 overall against teams outside of the valley.