Plant City’s pass-heavy offense has been on fire in 2018 and much of that comes from the play of senior quarterback Braxton Plunk. Plunk has thrown for 1,873 yards (234.1 per game) and 20 touchdowns this season, and he’s also scored twice running the ball. Last week, Plunk threw three touchdown passes and added a fourth on the ground to go with a career-high 74 rushing yards in the 35-6 win over Durant.
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You’ve got a big game coming up on Friday with Bloomingdale coming to town. What are you looking forward to and what’s your goal?
Just the atmosphere, a lot of people are gonna be there. Seeing how this community rallies around us and has our back, and seeing how these guys play. Our coaches are doing a great job preparing us all week so hopefully, we just go out there and execute, play to the best of our ability.
You all had some high expectations going into the season and so far you’ve delivered. How do you not let stuff like that get to your heads too much and stay focused on the things that win these ball games?
Understanding our expectations. Our coaches and our team, we all have the same expectations — a district championship. We make sure everything we do throughout the week is leading to that and making sure we have the right mindset.
When quarterbacks take off running with the ball and have to go down, most people want them to slide. You like to dive headfirst and take the contact. Does that worry the coaches a little bit?
They tell me, “Just try to score every time you touch the ball.” So it’s just doing whatever helps the team and whatever can get us to a win. The offensive line played great last week, I don’t think we had a sack and we manhandled (Durant) up front, which was pretty impressive.
What’s been your favorite moment of the season?
I don’t know about that. It’s been a great season so far. I feel like the next two games are going to be two great moments for us. They could be two statement wins if we execute and do what the coaches tell us to do.
If that works out, then I guess that favorite moment would be getting back into the playoffs.
Yes, sir. That’s definitely the goal: district championship and playoffs.