Montgomery football had a renaissance season in 2025, going 10-2 with a 9-game win streak at one point. They made the district title game, losing to Line Mountain (20-14), and that's where the off-season motivation began for the Raiders.

"I've been in the weight room since that day," said returning back Cameron Woltz. "I've been putting in the work to get stronger, bigger, and faster."

Still, they can't hide the excitement from a season like the last one they just had.

"I'm ecstatic coming into the season," said returning lineman Connor Jarrett. "We have a lot of returning guys - eight guys on offense, eight guys on defense. Just a lot of expectations going in, but it's my job as a captain to remind all these guys it's one week at a time, beginning with Hughesville week one."

They have over 2,000 yards of rushing returning with Trace Furman (1,061 yards, 13 touchdowns) and Josh Knoebel (1,115 yards, 21 touchdowns). That's as good a place to start as any, especially since they have to replace their starting quarterback.

On the defensive side of things Furman had 121 tackles a year ago while Woltz finished with 110, while they return nine players who combined for 16 sacks last season.

That familiarity is what they believe will get them over the hump.

"We're not learning much new so we're just going to focus on getting better with what we do," remarked Woltz. 

The defending Small School champs will have a new league to conquer this year as CV has moved out, while Canton and Wyalusing have moved in. They also boast games against Hughesville, Troy, Towanda, and NP-Mansfield.

"Our expectation doesn't change versus who we're playing, we just want to go out there and win," Woltz said.

Winning is something Montgomery hasn't always been used to.

"I've seen us go from a 1-9 program to 10-2 last year," Jarrett said. "It takes a lot of hard work, and I don't know if people realize that. We've been in the weight room, and we've been out practicing for a long time. It doesn't change over night, it's a lot about the guys who are out there, the guys that want to be leaders, and want to go out and play the best football that they can."

Montgomery coach Joel Knoebel has seen firsthand out things have changed as they've gone from a 20 man roster to pushing 40.

"It's huge," he said. "You can have effective practices with those kind of numbers. You get more buy in, and that excitement carries over to other sports in the school, and into the student body."

With all that excitement and expectations it can be hard to keep kids focused day to day, but Knoebel isn't worried.

"They're very goal oriented, and they don't want to get ahead of themselves," he said. "We got one week at a time."