For the first time in school history, Parkers Chapel is at home to start the postseason.
Tonight, the Trojans (6-4), the 8-2A’s No. 3 seed, play host to Poyen (7-3), the No. 4 seed from the 5-2A, in the first round of the 2A playoffs.
Game time is set for 7 p.m. from Victor Nipper Stadium.
The schools share several similarities in that their football programs are still relatively young compared to others across the state, and they each have not tasted success in the playoffs for quite some time.
The Trojans, making their 10th appearance in the postseason, haven’t won a playoff game since beating Walnut Ridge back in 2010.
The Indians posted first-round wins in 2012 and 2014, but have been ousted in the first round in their last two appearances in 2015 and 2017.
Each team also enters tonight’s game off of lopsided losses with the Indians having dropped two straight to Mountain Pine and England after a 7-1 start.
Both schools also have game-breakers with Parkers Chapel senior quarterback Caleb Jacobs running an offense that has scored 38 or more points in their six wins, while the Indians have rushed for over 3,000 yards as a team and average just over seven yards per carry this year with junior Brandon Sanchez averaging 182 yards per game.
Sanchez did not play last week at England due to a knee injury, but Poyen coach Vick Barrett is expecting the junior to play tonight.
“He says he’s good to go, so that’s what we’re taking it as,” Barrett said.
“We as coaches, you want to win every game, but when you’re going into a game like that, the weather was terrible and it was a messy field and you already have a tweaked knee, you hate to put a kid out there and hurt something worse.”
The Indians also lost quarterback Jaxson Carter to an ankle injury early on against England, and Barrett was unsure if he would be able to play.
“He went down and popped his ankle. We’re hoping he’s back this week, but we don’t know for sure,” Barrett said.
“He’s a super-tough kid. He’s a leader. He played three games with a fractured shoulder, his throwing shoulder. The doctor said, ‘Look, you can’t make it any worse,’ and he said, ‘Well, I’m playing.’ That’s just the kind of kid he is.”
For Parkers Chapel coach Elliot Jacobs, the Indians are much better than what their seed indicates.
“I’m scared to death,” Jacobs said. “They’re a good football team. Going into the last week of the season, it looked like we weren’t going to play them, but they had some injuries, and England snuck up on them and put them in the four seed.
“They’re not a four seed. They’re a dang good football team, and our kids can’t overlook them. They’re a bunch of kids who play hard and are very well-coached.
“We’ve never been in this situation to get to host a playoff game, so we have to make sure that the moment is not too big for us, settle down early, make some plays and try to get out of there with a win.”
Trying to slow down Jacobs is the top priority for the Indians, but the senior has made life difficult for opposing defenses this fall.
Jacobs has completed 60 percent of his passes for 1,977 yards and 19 touchdowns against four interceptions while also rushing for 712 yards and 14 touchdowns.
“I think everybody in the state knows that their quarterback is a stud,” Barrett said.
“He’s good. He’s just so smart with the ball. We’ve played some athletic quarterbacks that can run and do some things, but as we watched film, it was just like, he can run and he’s smart with the ball.
“He’s heady. He finds the guys when they’re open, and his receivers do a heck of a job of getting open and staying with him when he’s scrambling around.
“Offensively, they’re explosive. You can’t take a play off, and you can’t let guys get out of coverage chasing him or he’ll find them, so the front six have to do a really good job of trying to contain him and keeping him hemmed up.”
The 5-2A has a couple of dual threat quarterbacks in Cutter Morning Star’s Sam Moore and Mountain Pine’s Collin Smith, and Barrett said that should help his team.
“I think it gives us something to look back on,” Barrett said. “We can say, ‘Look, he’s similar to this guy, remember when we had to play him.’ We can look back to those game plans and figure that kind of stuff out. It won’t be the first time we’ve seen a quarterback that’s athletic.
“I don’t like to compare kids and say this one is better than this one, especially until I’ve seen them live, but he looks good. He looks like he will be tough to handle. He’ll just pull the ball down. Against Fordyce, he just pulls it down and goes 40 yards for a touchdown. We team camped in 7-on-7 with Fordyce, and we know what kind of speed they have. He’s just a dynamic player that you have to try to keep in check as much as you can.”
Barrett added that Moore was the quarterback that compared most favorably to Jacobs.
“He’s the one that’s really, really similar because he throws the ball and he’s shifty,” Barrett said.
“Mountain Pine’s Collin Smith doesn’t throw the ball as well, but he can fly. I think he leads our conference in rushing. Bigelow has a kid (Keithlin Brown) that’s a lefty that’s very similar to him, but he’s a sophomore. He’s not quite as seasoned.”
The Indians have struggled the last two weeks, falling to Mountain Pine and England, and Barrett said it was a teaching moment for his team.
“We’re sitting at 7-1 two weeks ago, and the kids kind of think, ‘Hey, we’re good.’ They don’t really know that you’re pretty good, but you have to come out and play every week because now instead of sneaking up on people, people are ready for you,” Barrett said.
“I think that’s one of the biggest challenges for us is keeping that in check. I have great kids and they come to work every day, but there’s a difference in thinking you’re good, and then showing up and playing that way. We’ve struggled the last two weeks.
“Against Mountain Pine, we had three turnovers that killed us, put us in bad situations and turned into 21 points for them.
“Last week at England, I would say we played probably the worst game we’ve played offensively altogether. It was just a bad deal. It was one of those Twilight Zone games, but credit to England, they played their tails off. We had a couple of injuries that hurt us offensively especially and probably hurt the team morale.”
The Trojans had an opportunity to force a three-way tie for the 8-2A crown, but fell at Junction City.
“We talked about it before the Junction game that we were going to go out there and try to execute and have fun,” Jacobs said.
“Neither one of those two things happened, and we got our starters out early. It is what it is. We didn’t come ready to play, and Junction whipped our butt. We’re not going to talk about it. We’re not going to dwell on it. We’re going to move on.”
When the Trojans have the ball, they will have to account for sophomore Anthony Nannemann, the Indians’ leading tackler, as well as a solid defensive line.
“We have three seniors and a junior that start there,” Barrett said. “They’ve been a solid unit for us. They’re pretty big kids that are strong and move well. They do a really good job.”
Jacobs said the Indians play a defense that he wanted the Trojans to utilize early in the season.
“We’ll see a 4-3, cover two, kind of what we were wanting to be early in the season until we had to get away from it,” Jacobs said.
“They play the defense that we feel gives us success. We just have to go out there and make plays.”
Having practiced against that defense will benefit the Trojans.
“It does,” Jacobs said. “It gives Caleb similar reads to what he saw in early fall camp. It’s not a defense that we’ve never seen before, so our kids have seen it, and they should have confidence going against it.”
Parkers Chapel is no stranger to success in sports, and while Jacobs said that should help those players that compete in other sports, the spotlight of hosting a football playoff game will be new for everyone.
“It’s going to help them personally, but as far as our team, it’s a team game, and a lot of our kids don’t have the football playoff experience that these kids have in other sports,” Jacobs said.
“It will help them individually. It doesn’t hurt them, and we welcome it. We want all of our sports to be successful. Hopefully, they can show our team how you’re supposed to handle that type of pressure situation, fight to the end and never give up. If they can show us that, and the other kids respond to that, we feel we can be successful.”
If the Indians are to advance, Barrett said his team must do two things.
“Establish the run and contain Jacobs,” Barrett said.
For the Trojans, Jacobs said that his defense can’t allow big plays and his offense must finish drives.
“Defensively, don’t give up big plays, keep everything in front,” Jacobs said.
“Offensively, finish drives. They’re a very well-coached team. They do the little things right. There’s a reason why their record is 7-3. They’ve had some injuries, but we expect all of their good guys to play. We expect a fight Friday night. We’ve got to come ready to play.
“Any time you’re playing a lower seed in the playoffs, a lot of teams like to overlook you. Mountainburg almost did it to us last year. If you make the playoffs, you’re a good team. Anybody can win on any Friday night, and we can’t overlook anybody. We’re not that good of a team to be able to do that.”