On a night where most Iowa high school football teams are scheduling scrimmages to prepare for their first official game of the year, WACO and Lone Tree will get jumpstarts to their seasons by participating in week zero games on Thursday, August 18th.

Practices for schools were eligible to start this week, but because of the time crunch WACO and Lone Tree were allowed to take it to the gridiron starting last week to prepare for the openers. This marks the second straight year WACO has participated in a week zero game and they will kick off their season hosting HLV. The rejuvenated Warriors bring back some experience from a year ago, as they look to build off a 3-6 campaign. HLV went to the first round of the 8-man playoffs last season with a 7-4 record.

Lone Tree will start up their season traveling to Central City. In their first season playing 8-man last year, the Lions adjusted well by posting an 8-1 record. They will have to reload at the skills positions as they lost their quarterback, top receiver, and top rusher to graduation. Last year, Central City went 3-7 but only lost five players to graduation.