2A: Don't look down on size of unbeaten Moose Lake/Willow River

As they have before every game this season, the Moose Lake/Willow River captains will meet with the officials and the opposing captains in the middle of the field just before 4 p.m. Friday for the pregame coin flip.

And as has happened before every game this season, the Rebels captains will be looking up into their opponents' faces and reaching up to shake their hands.

It's a scene that never fails to amuse coach Dave Louzek. Not because his charges are that much smaller than their foes -- captains Austin Jacobson, Michael Unzen and Shane Rehbein, who make up the Rebels' starting backfield, are all shorter than 5-8 and weigh less than 175 pounds -- but because Louzek knows opponents are in for a very disproportionate surprise.

"When they go out there, you can see the other team's players looking down at our kids," Louzek said. "They underestimate our ability by looking at our size. But these are weight-room kids. We're very fast, very shifty and very strong."

The numbers bear that out. Both Jacobson and Unzen are 1,000-plus-yard rushers. Rehbein, who plays fullback in the Rebels' counter/misdirection offense, is also the team's starting middle linebacker.

Against Luverne in the Class 2A semifinals, Jacobson and Unzen combined to run for 252 yards and three touchdowns and routinely used bursts of speed or power to turn short gains into long ones.

"These kids just have a great work ethic," Louzek said. "We've got a tradition of great running backs at Moose Lake/Willow River. In the 11 years I've been here, I think we've had 12 runners of 1,000 yards. These guys have been watching great running backs for a long time, and they've seen how hard they work."

As for what Moose Lake/Willow River can accomplish with its undersized armada of runners in Friday's Class 2A title game, its opponent, Waterville-Elysian-Morristown, would do well to ignore the Rebels' size and focus more on their 13-0 record.

"We're not exactly bulldozer, but we takes teams by surprise," Rehbein said. "All the teams we've played this season have been bigger than us. We're a lot stronger than we look."