Injury forces Sundberg into Hematites starting QB role

ISHPEMING — Wherever there is good news, there’s almost always some bad news to follow. And that seems to be the case for the Ishpeming football team.

The good news is that the Hematites are 1–0 on the season, thanks to a dominating win over Iron Mountain on Friday. Bad news is that quarterback Donald Denofre left the game due to injury and he’s expected to miss two to four weeks. Junior Gavin Sundberg now steps into the starting QB role and he’s glad the coaching staff has confidence in his play.

“That helps a lot. It makes me feel like I can perform for them and I should be able to. It makes you have confidence in your team when my coaches have confidence in me,” Sundberg said.

“We planned on playing those two equally all year. Fortunately, now we get to put in an experienced quarterback and he’s got to carry the load for a full game and he will. He’s a competitor. He knows how to compete. He knows how to battle. We’re going to look for some great things and some great leadership from him,” said head coach Jeff Olson.

This Friday, Ishpeming will travel to Norway to take on the 1–0 Knights, who beat the Hematites last year at the Ishpeming playgrounds.

“They’re not overly huge, but they have decent size and they’re skilled. I like to think we’re not overly big, but we have some skill and speed, too. It’s going to be a typical knock-down, drag-out bloodbath that we usually have with them,” Olson said.

Kickoff for Friday’s game is at 7 o’clock eastern, 6pm central and you can the highlights on Friday Night Frenzy.