Fort Loramie’s Maxwell Maurer glances backward as he gets room to run during a game against Dayton Meadowdale on Sept. 15, 2023 at Redskin Stadium. Maurer is one of seven key returnees for the Redskins this season.
Luke Gronneberg | Sidney Daily News
FORT LORAMIE — Fort Loramie is in a conference again for the first time since 2020.
The Redskins have joined the Northwest Conference and won’t have to worry about the many long trips they had to take to play games the last three seasons.
“As new members of the Northwest Conference, we play a lot of new competition,” head coach Spencer Wells said. “We look forward to developing rivalries within the league. The Northwest Conference is full of tradition and excellent coaches so we have our work cut out for us.”
Fort Loramie finished 2023 with a 6-6 record in a season where they reached the playoffs for the the sixth consecutive year and hosted a home Division VII playoff game. It is under the direction of Wells, who holds a 51-22 record in his six seasons as head coach.
“We have a lot of fresh faces on this year’s team,” Wells said. “With only five starters back on offense and four starters back on defense. We have new schemes on both offense and defense and our players have done an excellent job learning those so far.”
Key returners for Fort Loramie this season will be seniors Maxwell Maurer (WR/DB, first team all-Southwest district in D-VII, third team all-Ohio), Carter Eilerman (TE/DE, first team all-Southwest district, first team all-Ohio), Louis Hart (OL/LB), Ben Pleiman (OL/DL), Ty Kemper (FB/DE) and Cole Barnhorst (WR/LB). Another key returnee is junior Ray Hoying (RB/LB).
“Our main focus is becoming a consistent football team in all phases of the game,” Wells said. “Our players have displayed the necessary commitment and hard work throughout the off-season in order to achieve our goals as a program. We have high expectations and can’t wait to get the season started.”
Key newcomers to the team noted by Wells are juniors Johnston Hollenbacher (OL/LB), Jace Ruhenkamp (OL/DE), Sammy Goubeaux (LB) and Ace Boerger (FB/LB), sophomore Hayden Lehmkuhl (OL/DL) and senior Gabe Hart (QB).
Fort Loramie kicks its season off Friday when they will host rival Minster.
“It’s a really fun matchup and fun tradition,” Wells said. “We don’t really talk too much about winning and losing. It’s more about how soon can we play our best football. Our last scrimmage was against St. Mary’s and Marion Local, two teams that are always having a lot of success in their respective conferences.
“When you scrimmage teams like that, you figure out what your flaws are and you have to fix them. That’s the total focus right now going into Week 1, fixing what we need to so that we can play our best football as soon as possible.”
