The high school football season is starting earlier than usual.

The six Intermountain Conference teams, plus Culver, will bypass playing a jamboree and instead play in a zero-week game on Friday.

“We are tired of just practicing and not having a game to play,” said Summit senior linebacker Marco Larsen. “We are all ready to go out there and play a game. Everyone is just ready to show what we have all been working towards.”

Playing a week early comes with its benefits. It gives each team a bye week (no IMC teams have a game scheduled for Sept. 27) before starting league play. It also allows some flexibility should an early-season game need to be rescheduled for, say, smoky conditions.

“Luckily this year we haven’t had a smoke issue,” said Summit football coach Corben Hyatt. “This is the first year in like five seasons we haven’t had to have an indoor practice, which is unheard of.”

Of the six games involving Central Oregon teams on Friday night, five of the local teams will be on the road. Bend High will travel to face Gresham; Ridgeview will face Woodburn on the road; Caldera will take on Thurston in Springfield; and Culver will travel to take on Irrigon in a 9-man showdown. Mountain View will be the lone team playing at home when it takes on Springfield at Jack Harris Stadium.

Friday features a marquee showdown between two Class 5A state semifinal teams from a year ago as Summit travels to take on Silverton.

The Foxes are ranked No. 2 and the Storm No. 3 in the OSAAtoday 5A preseason coaches poll.

Reigning state-champion Wilsonville is ranked No. 1 and Mountain View, last year’s state runner-up, is No. 4.

“Silverton, in my mind, is the favorite in 5A,” Hyatt said. “I’ve told (Silverton coach Dan Lever) that we have had to have a sense of urgency the past two weeks.”

Summit has enjoyed a three-year stretch of deep runs into the postseason. Three years ago the Storm advanced to the 6A semifinals, two years ago they won the 5A title and last season they reached the 5A semifinals.

This is the first year that Summit does not return any major contributors from the 2022 state championship team. But the Storm does return six defensive starters from last season.

“We need our seniors and players who have played to show what it means to be a state championship team and a semifinal team — it all starts with us leading,” said Larson, a second-team all-state linebacker last season. “Coming from playing JV and freshmen is a lot different than playoff football. We just have to lead and show them what it’s all about.”

The Summit offense loses nine starters from last year’s squad and will hand the keys to its air-raid offense to sophomore quarterback Andrew Guthrie. Junior Alex Toolan is also expected to see meaningful series under center.

“We haven’t had this in our program probably in seven or eight years, where we have two quarterbacks who can win varsity games,” Hyatt said. “Andrew has a bit of an it-factor. He can run, he’s got an arm. We like what we have at our quarterback.”

Guthrie is following in the footsteps of John Bledsoe and Hogan Carmichael, two state title-winning Summit quarterbacks who got starts as sophomores. In Hyatt’s eyes, his young signal-caller stacks up just as well, if not better, than the previous two quarterbacks who started as sophomores. Yet, he’s aware that there will be some early growing pains for a player making the jump from freshman football to varsity.

“There are going to be times where you are going to think ‘Wow, that was amazing,’” Hyatt said. “And there are going to be times where you say ‘Wow, that was not very good.’”

The Storm, as has become their norm, are playing quite a difficult nonleague schedule. After Friday’s game against Silverton, Summit will take on Highland, Idaho’s defending state champions, in Boise next Saturday. Then Summit will have its home opener against Wilsonville — facing the Wildcats for the fifth time in three seasons — before wrapping up its nonleague schedule against Henley, last year’s 4A state champions.

“I think we are all excited that we are playing a hard schedule rather than an easy schedule,” Larson said. “We are starting off playing playoff-football right away. I think it is a perfect way to get us ready for the season.”