HARRISBURG – A team with a Tiger mascot will advance to the Class 11AA football semifinals. That statement is guaranteed, as third-seeded Harrisburg will host sixth-seeded Huron in the quarterfinals at 6:30 p.m. tonight.
“I believe that we received a fair draw. We played them well the first time and believe that will give us some confidence going into the game,” Huron coach Michael Schmitz said. “This is a different team than we faced before, but we will also have some new things put in.”
Huron, which is now 4-5, recorded a 14-0 victory against Harrisburg, which was ranked No. 1 at the time, during the third week of the season on Sept. 7 at Tiger Stadium. It was the first of two shutouts on the season for the Huron defense.
“I thought that we had a pretty good defensive game plan that allowed our team to play fast and aggressive,” Schmitz said. “Offensively, we showed some sparks of moving the ball, and we need to continue that.”
The victory in the first meeting capped a 3-0 start to the season for Huron and moved it to the No. 1 spot in the Class 11AA ranking. After the solid start, Huron suffered setbacks in five of its final six games.
Harrisburg has since won four of its final six games to finish the regular season at 5-4.

“Harrisburg has really added some power formations while they have also started to really stretch the field,” Schmitz said. “We have worked to get back to the basics to allow us to play fast. We really need to stay focused and be aggressive on defense.”
Pierre, which finished the regular season at 7-2, holds the No. 1 seed for the 11AA playoffs and will host No. 8 Spearfish (2-7) at 6 p.m. today in the quarterfinals. Fourth-seeded Brookings, which is 5-4, will host fifth-seeded Mitchell (4-5) at 7 p.m. today at Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium on the South Dakota State University campus.
The winner of those games will meet in the Class 11AA semifinals on Nov. 2.
Second-seeded Yankton, which is 5-4, will host No. 7 Sturgis at 6 p.m. today at Crane-Youngworth Field. The winner of that game will meet the winner between Huron and Harrisburg in the semifinals.
The Class 11AA championship game is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 9 at the DakotaDome on the University of South Dakota campus in Vermillion.