GAYLORD ― It’s Homecoming week in Gaylord. And not just for the students.
GHS’s Homecoming game highlights Week 6 of the Gaylord-area high school football season on Friday, Oct. 3, as the Blue Devils host Alpena, as well as the program’s former head coach and new leader of the Wildcats, DJ Szymoniak.
Gaylord St. Mary will also be defending an undefeated record as it travels to Pellston, and Johannesburg-Lewiston will look to get win No. 1 of 2025 at Oscoda.
This week brings some more interesting matchups before things really heat up in Week 7. Here are the Week 6 previews:
Gaylord (5-0, 3-0 BNC)
Gaylord vs. Alpena (0-5, 0-3 BNC)
Last meeting: Gaylord 51, Alpena 0 (2024)
On paper, this game shouldn’t come with much fanfare. Gaylord enters their Homecoming game undefeated and tied atop the Big North Conference standings with Escanaba (5-0, 3-0 BNC). Alpena enters the game winless, most recently falling 24-0 to a Petoskey team the Blue Devils beat two weeks ago.
However, if you know the full story, you know this game will mean a bit more to both sidelines.
Gaylord and coach DJ Szymoniak parted ways last winter after a rough 2024 season that ended with a 3-6 overall record. Szymoniak, who left GHS with the fourth-most head coaching wins in program history, wouldn’t stay out of coaching long, agreeing to join Gaylord’s BNC foe Alpena for the 2025 season. His staff includes a few of his assistants from his days at GHS and his son, Andrew Szymoniak, starts at quarterback after finishing last season as the Blue Devils’ QB1.
Meanwhile, Gaylord is 5-0 in 2025 under the new head coach and a former assistant under Szymoniak, Matt Silsbury.
This should be Gaylord’s game to lose, but funny things can happen in the midst of a high school football game when emotions are running high. And, with a de facto conference championship game against Escanaba next week, GHS cannot get caught looking ahead and looking past the Wildcats.
Gaylord St. Mary (5-0, 4-0 SVC)
St. Mary at Pellston (3-2, 2-1 SVC)
Last meeting: GSM 62, PHS 14 (2024)
Gaylord St. Mary has been rolling through its schedule the past three weeks, cruising to a 47-point win over Forest Area in Week 3, a 28-point win over Bellaire in Week 4 and a 40-point win over Onaway in Week 5. The schedule does start to pick up in the second half of 2025, and Pellston should put up a bit more of a fight than in years past.
The Hornets are currently third in the Ski Valley Conference standings with wins over Forest Area and Bellaire, their lone conference loss coming to Central Lake. Still, GSM having QB Nathan O’Connell back from injury will be a game changer for the Snowbirds’ offense. He scored two touchdowns in the win over Onaway, a 63-yard TD pass to Cal Royce and a 15-yard run that helped GSM put the game away in the first half.
Johannesburg-Lewiston (0-5, 0-3 NMFC-Legacy)
JoBurg at Oscoda (2-3, 1-2 NMFC-Leaders)
Last meeting: Oscoda 24, JoBurg 14 (2022)
The JL program has fallen on hard times over the past four seasons, but 2025 was shaping up to be different after a record turnout and a new level of enthusiasm in the summer had sparked a bit of life into the once proud Division 8 program. After Week 1, that enthusiasm looked to have helped JL turn the page on their past struggles as they fought into double overtime with Burton Bendle, only losing when they failed to stop the Tigers’ final two-point attempt.
Now, JoBurg has fallen to 0-5 and, with only four more chances to get rid of that 0 in the win column, will travel to Oscoda in hopes of doing just that.
The Oscoda Owls used to be a league opponent for JL, but have since moved to the Northern Michigan Football Conference-Leaders division. They come into Week 6 with wins over Roscommon and Tawas, as well as close losses to Kalkaska and Elk Rapids on their resume.
JoBurg’s schedule doesn’t get any easier after this week, facing Maple City Glen Lake, Mancelona and Manton to finish the season, so the Cardinals may put some extra emphasis on pulling out this victory. If the team that showed up in Week 1 can show up again in Week 6, anything is possible.
Contact GHT Sports Editor Dylan Jespersen at Djespersen@gaylordheraldtimes.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @dylanjespersen, and Instagram, @dylanjespersen
This article originally appeared on The Petoskey News-Review: Gaylord’s Homecoming game vs a former coach highlights Week 6 – football previews
Reporting by Dylan Jespersen, The Petoskey News-Review / The Petoskey News-Review
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
