Sports
Preview: Parkersburg South Prepares For Matchup With Offensive Powerhouse Capital [Video]
< < Back toIt’s the first round of playoffs in the mountain state and Parkersburg South will be fighting to take down the number one seeded team in Class AAA–Capital.
The Capital Cougars just wrapped up an undefeated 9-0 season and also grabbed the Mountain State Athletic Conference title for the first time since 1997.
The Parkersburg South Patriots suffered a tough 17-14 loss last week in the Civil War against cross-town rival Parkersburg. South coach Mike Eddy said the Patriots are moving forward this week.
“I don’t think we played well from a technique standpoint,” Eddy said. “It’s being able to play within the system and focus on doing your assignment and not everyone else’s.”
The last time Capital and Parkersburg South matched up was in the first round of the Class AAA playoffs in 2003. In that game the Patriots walked away with a 35-0 victory and finished off the season with the state title.
Eddy has thought about the comparison between this year’s team and the 2003 state title squad.
“We have a lot of that kind of potential and I’ve seen a lot of that kind of growth out of our players,” he said. “It’s just continuing to improve upon the basic fundamentals. The games we go out and play technique sound we are really hard to beat but when we don’t employ those things we work on in practice we struggle to win games.”
Capital is an offensive powerhouse averaging 52.6 points per game this season. In week eight, the Crusaders defeated Nitro with an unbelievable score 91-14.
“They’re pretty special, they have a lot of talented football players,” Eddy said of Caital. “They’re big upfront so it’s hard to strain yourself to control the line of scrimmage because they will have a definite size advantage up there. They have a ton of speed and their quarterback is just as capable as their running back.”
The Patriots are well aware they are going in as the underdogs in this match up but that won’t stop them from trying.
“We can’t control Capital or what they’re like. We can’t control the history of the game. We can just control how we go out and perform our job,” Eddy explained.
Kickoff is set for 7:30 p.m. at the University of Charleston’s Laidley Field.
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