Staff Photo by Jake Olson Fairmont football's Travon Harvey pushes out his teammate during Monday afternoon's practice at Mahoney Field.

FAIRMONT – At the bottom of Fairmont football head coach Mat Mahoney’s practice plan for Monday’s schedule stood a foundational quote that should ring through the ears of many, providing a new way of thinking for his team entering the 2025 Section 3AAA Football Tournament.

“You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending,” Mahoney read with a smile as he pointed to the paper.

This is the exact mindset Mahoney and his coaching staff want to display for this season’s roster, forgetting the low points of this past fall while mentally gearing up to start anew in a win-or-go-home situation.

“You’ve got to play without any regrets,” Mahoney said. “You can’t look back and say, ‘I wish I could have done this or that.'”

Fairmont (4-4) enters the postseason coming off a loss last Friday to St. Peter, who, in the eyes of Mahoney, was simply a better team. While the final score of the evening showed 21-8, the Saints outgained Fairmont by just 17 yards, 205 to 188, in what was an overall physical matchup between the two teams.

Now, the Cardinals have earned the five seed in the sectional tournament, playing a familiar foe in No. 4 Tri-City United (3-5) on Tuesday afternoon for a chance to advance to the semifinals against No. 1 Waseca.

Fairmont saw the Titans just 11 days prior, traveling to Montgomery on Friday, Oct 10, to take on this Big South Conference opponent. It was ultimately Tri-City United who got the upper hand over the Cardinals, outscoring Fairmont 21-0 in the final three quarters while earning its second win of the season.

Tri-City United ended the game with 337 rushing yards while picking up nearly five yards per attempt. The Titans held quarterback Joe Long and the Fairmont offense to just over 100 yards of scrimmage on the evening, flexing what Mahoney called their best performance of 2025 on both sides of the ball.

“They did about everything right that night,” Mahoney said. “They ran the ball well, blocked well, and everything kind of just went their way.”

However, Fairmont now has a chance of redemption.

The biggest key to any Cardinal success will be stopping the aggressive and unorthodox Titan rushing game.

Powered by running backs Keegan O’Meara and Parker O’Malley, who combined for 188 rushing yards during the first meeting between these teams, Tri-City United will aim to chew clock with long sustaining drives ending in touchdowns, keeping any opposing offense off the field as much as possible.

“We know now the speed of how they do it, which makes an impact,” Mahoney said. “But it’s also on just how we align. Whether it’s a yard inside or outside, whether its brining a safety down in the box, there are so many different ways that we are going to realign ourselves against them.”

Another aspect Mahoney wants to see improvement in this time around against the Titans is his offensive unit’s performance.

Tri-City United held Fairmont to their lowest offensive output in the 2025 regular season, forcing four turnovers while consistently keeping the Cardinals behind the sticks. Coming into this game, the determination for sustaining drives and controlling the line of scrimmage is a must.

“Again, it comes up front,” Mahoney said. “It comes down to controlling the line of scrimmage, and we didn’t do that at all the first time we played them, and our guys feel like they didn’t play up to their potential. I think we are just going to get a better outing from those guys this week.”

Tuesday’s game between Fairmont and Tri-City United will begin at 7 p.m. The winner of this matchup will play the No. 1-seeded Waseca Blue Jays on Saturday, who earned a first-round bye.