KC ranked fifth in new poll
Sep. 8—With an eye not on the past few years, but on the now, Kilgore College looks to be ruling Texas junior college football, and is getting respect on the national level, as well.
The more things change, the more they stay the same, and coach Willie Gooden's Rangers are ranked fifth in the NJCAA's top 15 poll following the first slate of games of the season last weekend. That's up one spot from the sixth-place ranking a week ago.
Hutchinson (Kan.), the defending national champion who ran the table as number one a year ago, then beat Snow (Utah) in the championship game, was upset last week, suffering its first loss since 2019, and then falling out of the top 10 all the way to 11.
As a result, Snow College — who comes here to R.E. St. John Memorial Stadium to play KC in a non-conference game on Oct. 23 — is the nation's new number one team. Northwest Mississippi Community College is number two, followed by Garden City (Kan.) at three and Iowa Western in fourth place.
KC is fifth, Mississippi Gulf Coast sixth, Independence (Kan.) is seventh, KC conference rival Trinity Valley is eighth, Iowa Central is ninth and Coffeyville (Kan.) is 10th. Cisco, the defending Southwest Junior College Football Conference champion who dealt KC its only loss in the 2020 season (which was played in spring 2021, due to COVID), is unranked after being upset by Navarro in the first week.
Navarro checks in at 14 in the poll after the upset. Another SWJCFC school, New Mexico Military Institute, is right in front of that, at 13.
Snow College moving to the top spot could be a gift for the Rangers. If both KC and Snow can run the table until that day, not losing, and should KC spring the upset, the Rangers would almost guarantee a spot in the top four teams at the end of the season, and would have a win over number one in their back pockets.
Over the summer, the NJCAA instituted a four-team playoff, similar to the one in major college football. The top-ranked team in the poll after the regular season will host the fourth-ranked team, and the second-ranked team in the poll will host the third. The two teams who win those games will play at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock, Ark., for the NJCAA's football Division I national championship.
Right now, Gooden and the Rangers, who beat Tyler by three touchdowns at Rose Stadium last week, will focus on Blinn. Blinn didn't open its season as planned; last weekend's game against Southern-Shreveport was canceled.
The Rangers' first home game of the season is next Saturday, Sept. 18, against Northeastern Oklahoma A&M.
KC has gone 26-5 since the beginning of the 2018 season, with former coach J.J. Eckert having bowed out after going 10-2 in '18. Gooden assumed the reins in 2019, and went 8-2, then 7-1 in the 2020-2021 spring season, and last week's win at TJC.
