Eagles Can Grind Out A Win

The Wright City Wildcats had their fill of the Southern Boone Eagles football team last fall.

First, a 35-6 rain-shortened pummeling in Wright City and then the Wildcats absorbed a 49-0 pounding in Ashland in the district playoffs.

No doubt, the Wildcats will be looking to avenge those embarrassing losses – but do they have the firepower? We will find out when the two teams meet again on Friday in Ashland. Kickoff is 7 p.m.

The Wildcats defeated Winfield in Week 1 with a 35-20 win, showing off quarterback Sean McDonald – who threw for 246 yards and showed his mobility with two 40-plus yard runs.

McDonald likes to throw the ball to Devon Holmes, who had 7 receptions for 183-yards and a touchdown last week. Holmes is tall and fast and has the ability to run right past defenders– as he did in an 88-yard TD pass play – or run downfield and out-jump them for the ball.

It will be an exciting matchup to watch Holmes work to get open against Eagles defensive back Sam Stichnote.

McDonald also thre a TD pass to Cameron Cole on a nice roll-out play that showed off McDonald’s strong arm.

But while the Wildcats seem to have some firepower on offense, they also turned the ball over four times. And their defense gave up 229 yards passing and 200 yards rushing to a Winfield team that will not likely be a top four squad in their district.

The Wildcats have a pair of athletic defensive back in Jayden Mahaney and Will Janowski – 5 and 6 tackles respectively and both had an interception last week – and Rickey McDonald anchors the defensive line.

But the Eagles clearly have the opportunity to control the clock, keeping McDonald off the field, by unleashing running backs Jackson Sartain and Cooper Mange. SoBoCo had 201 yards of offense last week, but some costly, first-game errors – bad snaps, penalties, missed blocking – kept the Eagles from easily gaining another 100-yards.

The keys to winning this week for Southern Boone will be for the defense to contain McDonald and Holmes and the offense to grind out long drives, eating up chunks of yardage and clock, for touchdowns.

It might not be a cake walk like last year’s games, but look for the Eagles to win comfortably – and gain 250-yards or more on the ground.

Prediction: Southern Boone 27 Wright City 14