Demopolis sticks with region play this week when it hosts Wilcox Central, a team it downed 79-6 a season ago.
“We’ve got a different team,” Demopolis head coach Tom Causey said, contrasting this season’s meeting with its immediate predecessor. “We’re not really concerned about scores. We’re more concerned about us getting better today. It shouldn’t matter who we play any Friday night.”
The game comes a week after the Tigers blew out region foe Central-Tuscaloosa 53-8. Despite outscoring opponents 95-11 over the last two weeks, Causey sees plenty at which his team needs to get better.
“We’ve got to get better at our hat placement, angles and execution,” Causey said. “We’ve got to get better at the little things.”
As they head into the fourth game of the season, the Tigers are still trying to develop the depth and experience necessary for navigating the long season. Last week, Causey did not see what he wanted from his reserve players.
“I expected a lot more out of our twos than what they did Friday night,” Causey said. “But we got a good (junior varsity) win out of them (Monday) night and the more reps they get on Monday night, the better they will be on Friday night.”
That junior varsity win came at the expense of Brookwood. The turning point came with just under eight minutes to go in the fourth quarter when freshman running back Demetrius Kemp dropped back and chunked the ball deep to sophomore wideout Rodney Harper to convert a fourth and 13 situation and put the Tigers down into the red zone. Just a few plays later, Harper came through again when he hauled in a touchdown pass from freshman quarterback Tyler Oates to put Demopolis up 6-0. Kemp added the two-point conversion run to extend the game to 8-0. Junior defensive back Pat Taylor intercepted a Brookwood pass to ice the game with a little over a minute to play.
Causey is hopeful his second unit players can parlay that success into productivity Friday night if they get into the varsity game against Wilcox Central.
“Our guys that are way down the depth chart need to be paying attention because they may be put in a situation where they have to be ready to go in,” Causey said.