News File Photo Alpena High quarterback Jake Zann throws a pass which was caught by Easton Srebnik during the first quarter of a football game last week at Park Family Field at Wildcat Stadium.

ALPENA — The Alpena High football team has plenty of reason to feel good after a season-opening win last week at home.

But the Wildcats are still hungry to show their full potential.

Alpena (1-0) will attempt to do just that tonight on the road against Marquette (0-1).

The two teams, who are now Big North Conference rivals, have played one another every year since 2019, with the exception of 2020 and Alpena won the most recent matchup, 18-16, last year.

“We’re hungry,” Alpena coach Eric Mitchell said. “We really want to put together four quarters and show people what we can do.”

Alpena never trailed last week in a 34-33 win over Flint Powers. But Mitchell and his staff found plenty that needed fixing last week after the Wildcats raced out to a 27-3 lead and then held off a late rally for the win.

Still, scoring 34 points — the first time they’ve scored 30 points in a game since 2019 — was impressive and Mitchell is eager to see his team’s offensive success continue. Last week, Jake Zann passed for 146 yards and three scores, one each to Joe Sheridan, Easton Srebnik and John Kurowski.

On the ground, Eli Chism and Kaleb Donajkowski rushed for 90 and 65 yards respectively.

“We were really happy, knowing with our base stuff we can get the job done,” Mitchell said. “We’ve been on the losing end of those games, and we got the monkey off our back and were able to finish off the game.”

A win tonight would give Alpena its first 2-0 start since 2018, but Mitchell knows it won’t come easy. Marquette is coming off a 36-7 loss to Gladstone, but the Wildcats aren’t taking the Redmen lightly.

“We’re expecting a game like last year,” Mitchell said. “We’re expecting a very hungry team and doing everything they can to win. They’re big up front, fairly physical, they’ve got some big guys that can go up and catch the ball.”

Marquette was limited to 181 total yards and just 30 on the ground last week. Marquette quarterback Jaxon Jurmu finished 15-of-27 passing for 118 yards, one touchdown and four interceptions.

Marquette’s only score came early in the fourth quarter on a 10-yard pass from Jurmu to Jacob MacPhee.

Monday marked the first day of classes for Alpena students and the Wildcats went back to school during practice this week, working to improve everything from special teams to offense to accounting for everyone on the field defensively.

With those mistakes corrected, the Wildcats are focused on putting together a complete game.

“We feel like we controlled the game for three quarters (last week). We were able to fix or adjust the mistakes we made,” Mitchell said. “We spent a lot of time fixing those mistakes and we feel confident.”