Rich Gonzalez

The Bears will face off against the student wrestling development program, Archangels of Fairbanks, on Saturday night in Wasilla.

KMXT spoke with the Bears head coach, Rich Gonzalez, and assistant coach, Dan Farmer, about the team's unexpected rise to the top and what prep they're doing for the big game.

Tell me about the game last week you guys won.

What was the atmosphere like at that, at that game?

Win or lose, it's been a really exciting, successful season, but, uh, we would rather win.

[laughs]

That was KMXT speaking with coaches Rich Gonzalez and Dan Farmer with the Kodiak Bears nine-man high school football team.

You can listen to the state championship game on KVOK at 98.7 FM this Saturday at 7:00 PM.

Let's hop in here.

Rich, Rich Gonzalez, how we doing, Rich? Says, "It's time to talk about our coaching, period.

The tape breakdown of some miscues on the defense and offense need to be fixed." I mean, it feels like we've been saying that forever, doesn't it, Rich? I, you know, I said a long time ago that, that Saleh should've been fired long before he was.

Uh, Tony Alexio says, "Does the O-line coach have experience?" Not really.

This is his second year as an O-line coach, and I gave him a ton of credit last year.

Uh, we have Mission Viejo.

So, um, in Rich Gonzalez's last rankings in the, from the southern section, uh, Mission Viejo, they're, uh, number six in Division III.

Uh, Oak Park tied for first in the southern section.

Um, they're probably one of the favorites in-

I don't wanna get too much into it, but watching that game last night made me think, oh man, two weeks in a row of, you know, you thought the Bears were gonna be down to QB three or QB two, whichever it was gonna be, and you thought the Browns, you know, may- maybe Watson's gonna take a little while to get going, and he hasn't.

Uh, real quick again in the chat, Rich Gonzalez, uh, "We can win only if we put pressure on the Bears quarterback." That's the thing, though, where you gotta put the pressure without blitzing.

That's the, uh, that's the scary part, because we saw, I...

N- and listen, Ben Johnson is saying he's not announcing a quarterback.

That's cool.

So a couple people, when I go out to Western Hunt Expo, Rich Gonzalez, he's on the field staff for... or Fox pro I've always talked to him.

I was like, Hey man, can we go out coyote hunting, you know, around the expo time? He's like, yeah, but it's not really the best.

And I'm like, why is it not really the best? I thought that was ideal.