KARNS CITY — Karns City and Brookville are not finishing the 2022 football season the way they started it.

That suits both coaches just fine.

The Gremlins (6-4) have won six of eight games since beginning the year 0-2. The Raiders (5-5) have won four of five games since starting the campaign 1-4. They will meet for the second time in four weeks when they clash in the District 9 Class 2A playoffs at 7 p.m. Friday at Clarion University’s Memorial Stadium.

Brookville won the regular season meeting, 34-7, at Karns City.

“We had four turnovers in that game and just didn’t execute very well,” KC coach Joe Sherwin said. “We need to clean some things up. Their quarterback had a big game against us and we have to control (running back Jackson) Zimmerman a little better.”

Brookville coach Scott Park doesn’t put much stock in the regular season contest. KC quarterback Eric Booher completed just two of 18 passes and threw three interceptions in that game.

“This is the postseason and these are gonna be two teams battling it out for a chance to play in the district title game,” Park said. “Karns City is Karns City. You always have to match their intensity. This game will be nothing like that last one.”

Booher may not be available for Friday’s game. He is listed as questionable with an ankle sprain and Sherwin said he’d like to make a decision on who’s going to be behind center by mid-week.

Mason Martin is the Gremlins’ backup quarterback. He's completed 12 of 19 passes for 153 yards in limited varsity action this year.

“Mason offers a different skill-set than Eric,” Sherwin said. “That’s why I’d like to settle on our starting quarterback as soon as possible, so we can run an offense suitable to whoever’s in there.”

The Karns City coach attributed his team’s slow start this season to “a lot of inexperience and new players joining the starting lineup.”

Park said Brookville had issues with its offensive line and injuries at the quarterback position early in the campaign.

Starting offensive linemen Baily Miller and Braden Long were not available at the beginning of the season for the Raiders. Since their return, right guard Jack Knapp was able to slide over to tight end.

“It’s given us another solid blocker,” Park said of Knapp. “The way our offensive lineup was set early wasn’t conducive to the spread. We lost our starting quarterback to injury in the first game and our No. 2 guy from last year didn’t come out. We wound up moving (wide receiver) Noah Peterson to quarterback and he had never played that position before.

“We switched to more of a power football style and once Noah got used to playing quarterback, our play improved.”

Peterson has thrown for 600 yards and seven touchdowns. In the 34-7 win over KC, he completed 13 of 14 passes for 103 yards and had eight carries for 125 yards. Zimmerman, who has 980 yards and 15 touchdowns rushing on the year, ran for 79 yards and four touchdowns that night.

“Noah had a good game against them,” Park allowed.

Brayden Kunselman has 54 catches for 676 yards and nine TDs for the Raiders. Knapp and Bryce Weaver anchor the defense at middle linebacker with 75 and 64 tackles, respectively.

Karns City’s rushing yardage is spread out — with Levi Hawk, Cooper Coyle and Booher leading the way — while Micah Rupp has 16 catches for 299 yards and three scores.

“It’s good to have that big-play threat in Micah,” Sherwin said. “Defenses have to respect him deep and that can loosen things up a bit.”

Defensively, middle linebacker Lucas Wright leads the Gremlins with 47 tackles. Freshman defensive end Mike Bell has 4.5 quarterback sacks, Nate Garing five interceptions and Coyle four.