By Jason Avery
News-Times Staff
With the 2018 season formally set to begin next week, a trio of Union County schools will be playing their benefit games tonight.
Strong will host Lafayette County with kickoff set for 6 p.m.
Parkers Chapel will also be hosting their benefit game, as the Trojans welcome Beekman Charter (La.) for a 7 p.m. start.
Smackover will hit the road and travel to Magnet Cove with game time set for 7 p.m.
For the Bulldogs, tonight’s game will be the first under new coach Sirl Wright.
“Getting some real action and being physical,” Wright said of what he wanted to see in the benefit game. “With small numbers, it’s hard to go 11-on-11, so just getting a good sweat in and hopefully we can get a good showing.
“Other than that, we want to come out of it healthy, so we can go into the season healthy because we don’t have large numbers. I’m guessing, but I think we’re around 20. With school starting this week, I’ve gained about five or six of them, so a lot of them don’t know the formats.
“It’s almost like the NFL. You just try to get them in there and get them to play as good as possible and find out who can produce.”
With their annual Blue & White Game rained out last week, Parkers Chapel coach Jacob Midyett said he is hoping several position battles will be resolved with tonight’s game.
“We’re looking to clear up some position battles,” Midyett said. “We’re trying to make sure we’re able to get in rhythm both offensively and defensively.
“Most importantly, we’re ready to see us compete and hit someone other than each other.”
Smackover and Parkers Chapel open their seasons at the Hooten’s Kickoff Classic a week from Monday, and first-year coach Brian Brown wants to see several things from the Bucks.
“We want to go over there and run our base offense and defense,” Brown said.
“We’re looking to get some backups some extra time to see where they fit. We want to see if we can line up on special teams and get some conditioning work.”
After taking on Nashville in their benefit game on Monday, El Dorado will host its annual Purple & White Game tonight at Memorial Stadium.
The gates will open at 5 p.m. with the action set to get underway at 5:30 p.m.