TAKING THE FIELD — John Paul Gessler and the Crusaders are back at home Saturday for a big test against Wheeling Central. - Andrew Grimm

STEUBENVILLE — Catholic Central is coming off a big victory last week as it prepares to finish up a four-game home stand.

The now 3-1 Crusaders, though, have their toughest challenge yet coming to Harding Stadium on Saturday night as perennial power Wheeling Central comes up the river.

“(Wheeling Central head coach) Mike Young has been a very good friend for 30 years,” Catholic Central head coach Eric Meek said. “He’s a class act. He runs a fantastic program. Obviously, they’re steady. They win every year, and they have a very good football team. Their defense is good, they’re aggressive, they’re quick offensively, their line is good and they’ve got excellent skilled people.”

The Maroon Knights enter the game with a mark of 2-1.

They have wins over Union Local and Williamstown while their lone loss is to Fort Frye.

The Maroon Knights are ranked No. 4 in West Virginia Class A.

“It’s a measuring stick for us and we have some outstanding opponents down the road as well,” Meek said. “Wheeling Central is probably the best team on our schedule. We feel like we have improved tremendously from Week 1. We feel like we’ve improved greatly from our first scrimmage to now. That is a credit to our kids and my assistant coaches. But this is definitely a huge measuring stick.

“We just are asking our kids to come out, play as hard as they possibly can, try to improve from a week ago, and we’ll see how things end up at the end of the ball game.”

Meek and Young have had a lot of battles over the years going back more than two decades of their teams playing one another.

“He’s been a very good friend for many years,” Meek said. “I coached against him when I was at Weir High, we had some great battles. In fact, the one year we played them back then we both were state champions. We maintained a friendship over the years and they’re a class organization.”

It’s also a meeting of local Catholic schools, which Meek pointed out have a lot of respect for one another on and off the field.

“The two schools have a lot of respect for each other,” Meek said. “Obviously they have the same values as far as the Christian and Catholic identity and the faith based culture of the schools and of the programs. And, whenever you face teams that have those values and they put God first, that’s something to greatly respect.”