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On its own merits, Tippecanoe Valley’s 7-4 record during the 2024 football season wasn’t bad, but it also wasn’t good enough as far as the guys coming back are concerned.
“Our players are pretty frustrated about 7 and 4,” head coach Steve Moriarty says of his 2025 group as the Vikings get set to open their season Friday with a visit to Plymouth for a first-ever matchup against the Rockies.
That 7-4 came on the heels of a golden three-season run of 28-4, which comprised tradition-rich Valley’s best mark over any three-season span in 40 years.
“The kids were frustrated because they’d been part of a really good year (in 2023 at 9-1), but I think (2024) was a good year, especially if you look at everything,” Moriarty says. “We were young and we were still kind of feeling out the new conference (the Indiana Northern State).”
Indeed, the Vikings had just three full-time regulars back defensively and two offensively one year ago, and merely eight seniors on their roster overall.
This time around, they have six starters back on defense and eight on offense — some of them two-way guys — plus 14 seniors on their roster overall.
“We’ve got a team that is hungry, very self-disciplined, and a team that is pushing each other,” Moriarty says.
In seniors Grady Moriarty and Wes Parker, the Vikings return two of their three All-INSC first-team selections from a year ago, the graduated Brock Derf being the other.
The younger Moriarty racked up 108 tackles from his linebacker spot last fall, including seven for loss, behind only Derf’s 119 and nine for club-high honors.
The coach’s son and Parker were also Valley’s two best running backs. Parker rushed 70 times for 870 yards, a silly-elite 12.4 average and a team-high 10 touchdowns, while Moriarty added 622 yards, a 6.5 average and six TDs.
Other starters back on offense include junior quarterback Hunter Stage, deep-threat junior wideout Owen Omondi, junior center Parker Adamson, senior guard Gage Overbey, and senior tackles Carlos Gonzalez and Kolten Sisk.
Junior guard Jacob Bradley is another candidate to start along the line.
Omondi caught 12 passes for 263 yards, a 20.9 average and his team’s only two receiving TDs last season.
As a sophomore thrust into his first full-time varsity action, Stage completed 34-of-74 passes for 487 yards with one TD against five interceptions.
As a team, the Vikings finished just 36-of-92 throwing for 562 yards and two scores against eight picks.
The elder Moriarty says his club must be more effective through the air to keep defenses honest, but adds that he believes it will be.
On defense, senior cornerback Hudson Shepherd (four fumble recoveries, one interception) and Omondi (two and two) at safety give Valley its top two back in takeaways at five and four, respectively. Omondi also had 54 tackles to rank fourth.
Other returning starters on that side of the ball include Sisk (23 tackles, four TFLs) and Gonzalez (23, three) along the line and senior Jamison Phillips (26 tackles, three TFLs, two pickoffs) at cornerback.
Senior Diego Gonsalez (28 tackles), Parker (28) and Tyran Kiser (17 as a freshman) add still more varsity experience.
Kiser and Gonsalez are favorites to start at outside linebacker, flanking the younger Moriarty in the middle.
Overbey, junior Michael Samuels and sophomore Logan Roberts are expected to see regular D-line time, and junior safety Hunter Paxton is part of a strong secondary.
“Our secondary and our linebackers did very well this summer,” Steve Moriarty says. “They fly around quite a bit, and our offensive line and backs should be good.”
Overbey, 13-of-22 on field goals (long of 46) and 72-of-74 on extra points over the last two years, provides the Vikings an established weapon at kicker. He also averaged 33.7 yards on 23 punts last fall.
Class 3A Valley’s matchup with 4A Plymouth on Friday will be the first of three straight road games to start the season. The journey continues with the annual Bell Game at rival Rochester and then a first-ever trip to Hamilton Heights.
The Rockies, members of the potent Northern Lakes Conference, went 6-5 last year, including a 33-32 overtime road upset over eventual 5A state runner-up Warsaw. The 2A Zebras closed 8-3. The 3A Huskies dropped to 4-7, but were 19-4 over the two prior seasons.
“We really do have a gauntlet, a really strong schedule,” Moriarty says.
That’ll include the INSC portion, although in the Vikings’ favor there, they’ll play four of their five league games at home after last season playing four of five on the road.
“The conference is trying to balance that out more for next year,” Moriarty says, meaning each of the six INSC schools would have two or three leagues games at home and two or three on the road, “but in these first couple years, things had to be fit in where they could.”
Knox and Jimtown tied for the inaugural INSC title at 4-1. Valley went 2-3. Four of the league’s six teams posted winning overall records and a fifth closed 6-6.
