Photo by Joe Lovell Martins Ferry’s Walkquem Cox runs upfield during a regular season game earlier this year. Cox is coming off a 172-yard, three-touchdown game last week as Martins Ferry hosts Buckeye Local on Friday.

MARTINS FERRY — Martins Ferry (3-2) and Buckeye Local (2-4) face each other Wednesday inside the Dave Bruney Football Complex in what is an OVAC clash, a local rivalry– and a family affair.

Either teams’ quarterbacks– the Purple Riders’ Colby Kropka and Panthers’ Grant Dombrowski– are second cousins, and Martins Ferry head coach Justin Kropka has a special connection to many on Buckeye Local’s squad.

“I know a lot of those kids over there,” coach Justin Kropka said. “When I was at Wheeling University coaching, COVID took out one of our seasons, and I actually went and coached my son who played for the Young Buckeyes. So I know a lot of those kids. It’s crazy how much they’ve grown. In fact, their quarterback is me and my son’s cousin.

“So there’ll be two family members at quarterback here for each team. My dad’s a Yorkville graduate, played for Jim Thomas, actually went undefeated his senior year. So I have some Buckeye Local connections. And our kids all know each other because, frankly, that team, when they were in fifth or sixth grade, it turned out to be maybe 10 guys that are on the field all played for that Young Buckeyes team. So I’m excited to see those kids, too.”

Martins Ferry is coming off one of the stranger weeks you’ll see in high school football- a week where the Purple Riders’ intended opponent backed out of their game, and then their backup choice fell through too. The third time was the charm for the Riders, who managed to find an available opponent in Uniontown, who Ferry defeated 59-13.

Martins Ferry is grateful to be going through this week knowing who their opponent will be on Friday.

“After last week, I think everybody’s frazzled,” Kropka said. “It’s rarely a week where you break down three different teams, but our coaches and kids, I thought, did an excellent job with that last week, handling all that commotion, and there’s a lot of things sometimes that, as a coach, are beyond your control and that’s what I stress to the kids.

“We can’t control what other teams do or what’s going on. I said we can only control what we can control and I thought we did a really good job of that last week.”

As for Buckeye Local, they’re coming off a 17-0 loss to Oak Glen, the latest of multiple games this season which the Panthers view as being a handful of plays away from a different outcome.

“I think we have core values in our program and the number one thing is consistency,” Buckeye Local head coach Chris Kiedaisch said. “And I think when we’re consistent in doing what we’re supposed to do, we’re a pretty good football team, but we haven’t done it play after play after play. So we’ve been really harping on being consistent, doing what their coached to do play after play after play because the majority of every game we’ve played, except for the Barnesville game, we’ve been in it, they’ve been close games for the majority of it.

“So we feel like we had the ability to win five of these first six. And if we were a little more consistent, we feel like we could have won five of those six. So just making sure we’re doing the little things play after play.”

After rushing for 172 yards and three touchdowns against Uniontown, Ferry sophomore Walkquem Cox will once again be at the top of the scouting report for the Purple Riders’ opponents.

“He’s a special athlete, especially for his age,” Kiedaisch said. “And the things he does with the ball in his hand are tough to stop. So, he’s clearly going to be a priority to slow the run game down, which we did not do well last week. That’s definitely been a focus of our plan defensively.”

“Everything starts with the running game with us,” Kropka said. “And we have a veteran offensive line and obviously, Luca Shane does a great job at fullback for us. Walkquem coming back always helps. And, due to some injuries, we’ve had some skilled guys on the outside not be able to play this game or that game, and, you know, probably some of them have been playing at 75, 70%, so we’ve had to kind of condense what we do.”

More than halfway through the season, both coaches pointed out how their teams are their share of bumps and bruises, and are focused on getting healthy for Friday, which is a long-running rivalry which had been put on pause for some time– Friday’s will be the two teams’ first meeting since 2018. Martins Ferry has the advantage in their head-to-head, 18-7.

“I think they’re much improved,” Kropka said. “And I think they’re going to get better and better as time goes on. It seems like they’re giving Coach Kiedaisch time to build there. So I think they’ll improve, and I think they’re a good test for us because we know Buckeye Local is going to get up for us.”

“It’s exciting for the community,” Kiedaisch said. “It’s a rivalry game and high school football is all about the kids. Anytime you get a chance to have them play against guys they know and guys they see around town is always a fun thing. So we’re excited for that aspect. We got banged up a lot, very physical game against Oak Glen last week. So we’ve taken it easy physically on the guys this week trying to get as healthy as we can for Friday night.”

Kickoff is set for 7 p.m. inside the Dave Bruney Football Complex.