COEUR D’ALENE, ID — Three seasons ago, the Coeur du Christ Saints were starting from scratch.
The football program had just 12 players, and only one of them, Jon Denke, had ever played high school football. Practices were about learning the fundamentals and figuring out how to build a team.
Now, the Saints are 9-0, the No. 4 seed in Idaho’s 1A state playoffs, and one win away from reaching the state semifinals for the first time in program history.
“It’s been an adventure,” head coach Kellen Clemens said of the program’s first season. “We were starting at the beginning, but they showed up every day. They worked hard. We got better.”
That first team finished 3-5. The core group returned the following season, put in the work during the offseason and helped the Saints take another step forward, going 7-1 in the regular season before falling in the state quarterfinals.
Each season has built on the one before it. And Clemens says the biggest difference has been the experience and leadership developing within the program.
“There’s not an ounce of quit in them,” Clemens said. “They show up every day. They work hard. … I think there’s a good core group of leadership here that’s starting to push one another and hold others accountable.”
Leading the Saints is Clemens, a former NFL quarterback who spent time with the New York Jets, St. Louis Rams and San Diego Chargers. After playing at the highest level of the sport, he’s now bringing that experience to Coeur du Christ, helping build a program from the ground up while teaching his players the game and the lessons that come with it.
“There’s a lot of life lessons. Football in particular, I think, because there’s a physicality of it,” Clemens said. “There’s that team component of it. There’s a lot of things that you can learn through the game of football that I think can carry you through life.”
For his son junior quarterback Grant Clemens, the growth has been about more than just wins. He’s been part of the program since the beginning and has watched the team develop alongside his teammates, including his father as head coach.
“All the coaches, we’ve gotten here because of them,” Grant said. “It’s been a great year.”
The junior has thrown 42 touchdown passes this season, but he’s quick to credit the players around him for helping make that production possible.
He pointed to the offensive line of Sean O’Neill, Anders Sundholm and Darien McCullagh, along with receivers Beckett Beyer and Matthew Junkin, and senior running back Jon Denke.
“I owe it to them that I haven’t gotten touched once this season,” Grant said. “It’s been a team effort. It’s been so fun to play with them.”
Beyer has become one of Grant’s top targets, while also seeing firsthand how much the program has grown since joining the team. The junior credits Clemens for pushing him to improve and says the work put in during practice and the offseason is starting to pay off.
“I’m not gonna lie, Coach Clemens,” Beyer said when asked what helped him reach this level. “He’s pushed me a lot since last year.”
The Saints have also found success on the ground. Denke, a senior running back, has eight rushing touchdowns this season. But for him, the biggest part of the team’s success is the group around him.
“More about the team,” Denke said. “I can’t do anything without my team.”
That connection has helped create what Denke describes as a brotherhood, one that has grown over the three seasons and helped push the Saints toward their biggest opportunity yet.
The next goal is one the program has been chasing since the beginning: a state playoff victory.
Clemens says reaching the postseason was a priority when the team set its goals before the season. But the Saints wanted more than just a playoff appearance. They wanted to win a game and keep moving forward.
“It’s important. It’s one of the things that we talked about when we were setting goals at the beginning of the year,” Clemens said. “Make the playoffs number one. But let’s win one. Let’s win one and see how that feels.”
The fourth-seeded Saints will get that opportunity Saturday against No. 5 Council. The game will be played at Lake City High School, giving the team a chance to compete in front of a local crowd.
After starting with just 12 players and learning the game together, Coeur du Christ now has a chance to take another major step in its third season.
One win would put the Saints in the state semifinals — and bring the program closer to the championship goal they’ve been building toward since day one.
COPYRIGHT 2026 BY KXLY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS MATERIAL MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED, BROADCAST, REWRITTEN OR REDISTRIBUTED.
