We continue our looks at each of our area football districts at the high school level with a peek at Class 1A District 4.

Sigourney/Keota is the lone area team in this district, and the Savage Cobras have to feel good about their group.

S/K knows the one team they’ll have a hard time beating is a perennial powerhouse, and that’s Iowa City Regina. The Regals went 13-1 last year and again claimed the Class 1A State Championship, their sixth in a row.

With a team like that in the district, the Cobras know it won’t be easy to get to the top. But that second playoff spot is up for grabs, and S/K has the best 2015 record of any of the other teams in the district.

Sigourney/Keota went 6-3 in the regular season before losing at home in the first round of the playoffs to Hudson in a thriller. They do lose big-time players in Peyton Crawford and Blaine Gretter, but could be in a good spot to claim that #2 position in the standings.

They’ll be battling with Highland, who went 4-5 last season and missed the playoffs. S/K knows the Huskies well, having played them the last couple of years in district play. Wilton, a 5-4 team who lost in the first round, is a similar team on paper to Highland, and could pose a threat to S/K’s chance to get that second spot.

The only other team that made the playoffs in this district in 2015 is Columbus Community, and they went 3-6 in the regular season and backed their way into a berth before losing in the first round. Sigourney/Keota has also handled Columbus in district play in previous years.

Louisa-Muscatine and Wapello are new teams for Sigourney/Keota, and both went 3-6 last year, missing the playoffs. L-M played in Class 2A last year and handed Central Lee their only regular season loss in district play. They could be easily forgotten, but they might have the biggest advantage to stake a claim to a playoff spot.

Wapello is cut out of a similar cloth of L-M, just without the signature win from a year ago.

Van Buren rounds out the district, and the Warriors went just 1-8 last year in Class A, and in all likelihood, they will not be a factor in the district race.

There are plenty of variables in this district from top to bottom, but the one known fact is that Regina will be the team to beat. Of the teams chasing them, it will be as unpredictable as any district in our area with who will emerge as the top threat.

We’ll keep in Class 1A for our district tomorrow, which is District 5 involving two successful teams from 2015: Pella Christian and Pleasantville.