![\"In](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/09\/2025-09-05-29-focusing-on-their-vision-1.jpg\")
The Grove City Wolverines are gearing up for another highly anticipated season. Ranked 23rd in the D3football.com Top 25 preseason poll and second in the PAC Coaches Poll, expectations are great heading into a 2025 season filled with fierce competition up and down the schedule.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With Grove City’s first game away at No. 10 Cortland tomorrow and more season-defining matchups on the horizon, the team hopes to build upon the strong foundation it established during preseason training camp and reach the playoffs for a third-straight season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Boasting a defensive core of seasoned veterans and an offense eager to prove itself, the Wolverines seem confident to handle whatever challenges this season-opening test will hold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Our program is built on vision. We have brick phrases in our program that we lean on for a lot of situations. One of the first brick phrases and our personal favorite is ‘focus on your vision, not your circumstance.’ We believe that playing on the road is a circumstance, and if we focus on our vision nothing can take our eyes off what we are doing,” senior fullback Anthony Brunette said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We build continually off all the reps we do throughout a practice week, repeating many different situations until we are used to seeing it and it becomes second nature. As to the mental toughness side \u2013 we are anchored in our identities and understand that playing in a hostile environment cannot make us change them, and it is this fact that allows us to play as one unit,” he explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That focus is sure to be front and center as the team heads into the all-important first game of the season. Due to the vast veteran presence on its defensive side \u2013 including a preseason All-American leader in senior linebacker Ben Bladel \u2013 Grove City has found some early motivation and momentum. Several returners bring encouragement on the field while also leading the team to foster attitudes of positivity and resilience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We returned a lot of people on defense and not as many on offense. It has been fun meshing with new guys that we may have not played with before. We really clicked when we had a scrimmage at the end of camp against Thiel. We put it all together and started to see our efforts paying off,” senior fullback Micah Walizer said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Thiel scrimmage allowed both sides of the ball to return to game-ready form. While the defensive side provided familiar stability to the team, the offense continued to bond, improve and expand the roles of its skill positions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With opening kickoff just over 24 hours away, Cortland, one of the top teams in the country, will see if the Wolverines’ defensive lines are ready to become a national power. Throughout the offseason after the team’s 17-14 playoff loss at Johns Hopkins, the coaching staff has instilled values of repetition and simulated game-like pressure during practices to ensure the team does not faulter in the biggest moments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the Wolverines, the goal is not to survive but to maintain their identity on the road. Veteran leadership \u2013 alongside new talent \u2013 will be the key to success this 2025 season. If defense holds the line and continues to set the tone, Grove City could find itself in a position to obtain a crucial early season ranked win.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Nevertheless, one thing remains imperative: the Wolverines intend to keep their vision front and center \u2013 no matter the circumstances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Football preps for their daunting 2025 schedule<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":292,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[195],"tags":[157,26,24],"class_list":["post-943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football","tag-nedilynn-bowser","tag-issue-2025-09-05","tag-sports"],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/09\/2025-09-05-29-focusing-on-their-vision-1.jpg",1280,782,false],"thumbnail":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/09\/2025-09-05-29-focusing-on-their-vision-1.jpg",150,92,false],"medium":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/09\/2025-09-05-29-focusing-on-their-vision-1.jpg",300,183,false],"medium_large":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/09\/2025-09-05-29-focusing-on-their-vision-1.jpg",768,469,false],"large":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/09\/2025-09-05-29-focusing-on-their-vision-1.jpg",1024,626,false],"1536x1536":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/09\/2025-09-05-29-focusing-on-their-vision-1.jpg",1280,782,false],"2048x2048":["\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/09\/2025-09-05-29-focusing-on-their-vision-1.jpg",1280,782,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Ian Schartner","author_link":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/author\/schartnerij23\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Football preps for their daunting 2025 schedule","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=943"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2020,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943\/revisions\/2020"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stuorgs2.gcc.edu\/thecollegian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Senior](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2026\/09\/2025-09-05-29-focusing-on-their-vision-2.jpg\")