The past two weeks certainly have been a turnaround for both the Durant Cougars and the Strawberry Crest Chargers, who will face each other in Dover Oct. 3. Perhaps the most luck has been with the Chargers, who were not badly beaten last Friday, but that likely won’t matter this evening.
When the chips for the playoffs are laid out on the table, there’s no way to know what two teams will show up in a district matchup.
It is, however, worth going back and examining the teams’ most recent games, because they can at least turn up some blueprints.
DURANT
If the Sickles game was one for the Cougars (3-2; 1-0 district) to remember, then last Friday’s game was one to forget.
Riding high with a 3-1 record, Durant walked into Gaither (3-2; 0-1 district) with high expectations, despite a few players seeing limited or no action because of injuries. Crispian Atkins, who had bruised his quadriceps in a practice, didn’t enter the game until later in the first quarter. And quarterback Erick Davis, who has been playing through a nagging ankle injury for the past two weeks, was held out of the game to speed up his recovery.
Those two don’t decide the fate of all three units, though, and the team as a whole played a sloppy game en route to a 23-7 loss.
“We learned that we need to be fundamentally sound, and we weren’t,” head coach Mike Gottman said. “We made too many mistakes on the interior line, defensively. Offensive line-wise, we had some crucial holding penalties. We just didn’t play real well.”
Although the secondary did a fine job containing the passing game (allowing one completion for 12 yards), the Cougars were completely unable to stop the run. Eight Cowboys combined for 309 yards and three touchdowns on the ground, despite not having a single running back eclipse 81 yards.
It was an uncharacteristically bad game for a typically dominant Durant defense, but this game also shined a new light on the Durant offense.
It looks as though it’s now clear just how heavily that unit needs Davis to work, given that Gaither’s defense has struggled in three of its five games played. Davis currently leads the team with 335 rushing yards and five touchdowns, averaging 111.7 yards per game in that area. Throwing the ball, he’s 10-for-15 with two scores and no picks.
Davis had tweaked his ankle against Tampa Bay Tech but still played against Plant City in the rain, with a swollen ligament. After sitting this week out, he’s feeling good and feeling anxious to get out there.
“It was very hard, but I understood that they needed to rest me for this game,” Davis says. “I’m looking forward to beating (Crest). They beat us in the spring game, and I want my revenge.”
STRAWBERRY CREST
Revenge might not come so easy against the Chargers (1-4; 1-0 district), who have somehow managed to play better than every other team in the area — besides one quarter of good Raider football — in the pouring rain of the last two weeks.
“I definitely think we’re starting to rally more as a team, both offensively and defensively,” senior wideout Clay Cullins says. “As a whole unit, we’re coming together and starting to click.”
Maybe it’s a little odd that it took wet weather for this to happen, given that the Chargers are a team built to rely much more on the passing game than the ground game. But, as is the case with the wet weather, every team is forced to run the ball a lot more when it’s too wet to throw.
And, no, the receivers don’t mind taking a backseat to the running backs.
“I know, for me, all I care about is winning,” Cullins says. “As long as the offense is succeeding, and we do what we need to do, it really doesn’t matter who’s getting the touchdowns now.”
In the Brandon game, a 9-6 win on the road, Crest gained 165 yards on the ground, led by Arjay Smith’s 168 (Chase Blackmon was tackled twice for a total loss of six yards) and one touchdown. Tristan Hyde completed two of his four passes, one to Blackmon and one to Cullins, for 26 yards.
Last week, despite running the ball more than throwing it, Crest’s passing game worked better than usual, as the team combined for 109 yards. Their touchdown, however, came when junior linebacker Dennis Mitchell scooped up a Freedom (4-1; 1-0 district) fumble and took it 84 yards to the house.
But, a loss is still a loss, and it’s something that Crest and head coach John Kelly want to improve on sooner than later. They know that Durant will be a tough test despite that loss and are hoping to put together a more complete game to catch a big win at home.
“You’re not gonna negate their run completely, because that’s philosophically what they do,” Kelly says. “Trying to limit some of the things they do well, that’s going to be key — defensively. Offensively, for us, trying to execute more so than we have in the past couple of weeks.”
Contact Justin Kline at jkline@plantcityobserver.com.
MATCHUPS
PLANT CITY
Plant City has had a worse two weeks than Crest and Durant, dropping both games in that span. But, last week’s game against Bloomingdale wasn’t anywhere near as close as the final score suggests.
Also troubling is the fact that, of the Class 7A District 8 teams that have played in district matchups, the Raiders (1-2-1; 0-1 district) are at the bottom of the standings. For a team loaded with athletic talent, however raw it may be, it’s disappointing to the players and the coaching staff.
Tonight, they will host East Bay, a team seeking a win in its first district game of the season, and one that has so far been a textbook example of that old sports term, “playing to the level of your competition.” The Indians (3-2; 0-0 district) just picked up a 14-7 win over Wharton at home, but has also lost to Lennard (28-7) at home and Spoto (13-12) on the road — two teams that combined for a 4-17 record last season, with three of those wins coming from Spoto.
East Bay couldn’t stop the run to save its life in its two losses, giving up 157 yards and three touchdowns to Lennard and 322 with two touchdowns to Spoto. Its biggest margin of victory came last week, with a seven-point win, and it stands to reason that the Indians will probably keep things close with the Raiders.
Fortunately for Plant City, this one has all the makings of a Markese Hargrove highlight reel waiting to happen.