Eagles fueled by playoff mindset
Despite a late fourth quarter surge by the Eagles last Friday at Stanley May Field, Cutter Morning Star suffered a heartbreaking 22-15 conference loss to cross county rival Mountain Pine.
The 2A-5 conference kickoff featured several big plays, highlighted by an 88-yard run for a pick-six with less than five minutes remaining in the final quarter by CMS senior Matthew Cook.
“Coming off the seven-point loss on the road against Mountine Pine — huge game for us — I’ve been emphasizing that to the kids all week — moving forward,” said Eagles head coach T.C. Shamel. “We’ve got to put last week behind us, put it to bed and move on.”
As the Eagles (2-2, 0-1) host the Quitman Bulldogs
(4-0, 1-0) tonight at Eagle Field, Shamel anticipates that his players will be ready to line up and compete after a week of solid preparation.
“We’re 0-1 in conference; we really need to be
1-1 after Friday night,” he said. “We’ve watched film; Quitman’s a team that we can play with. Once again, we can’t turn the ball over. We can’t make mistakes or we’ll get beat.”
After playing back-to-back games on the road for the last three weeks, CMS looks to capitalize on the home field advantage over the visiting Bulldogs.
“It’s nice to be back home after being on the road for three weeks in a row,” confirmed Shamel. “I think our kids are excited about that. We’re trying to put some homecoming distractions behind us, but I think we’re focused and we’re ready.
“We had a good practice, good film session and a good practice on Monday. I feel like we’ve got a good game plan in; we’ve just got to go execute it and not turn the ball over.”
While the Eagles continue to face dynamic contenders on Friday nights, Shamel feels the constant challenge has honed his team’s response and ability to produce plays.
“They’ve got No. 1 [Spencer Sipes], their tailback — big kid; runs hard. But we’ve seen that in Collin Smith at Mounatin Pine, the Hyatt kid at Magazine. We’ve seen that all year.”
Shamel and his coaching staff have attempted to instill a “playoff rep” mindset that reinforces the players to give it their all every play while pushing for a playoff spot.
“Everybody that plays is ready to do what they’ve got to do,” Shamel said. “We’re trying to access the playoff-rep mode. We really emphasize ‘playoff reps’ in everything we do in practice. In everything we do all over, whether it be on the football field [or] in the weight room.
“We need to have playoff reps, and we need to have them consistently. It’s not just every other play; it’s not once a series, but we’ve got to have playoff rep from everybody on our team every play. They’re starting to buy into that, but we’re still a little short every now and then. That’s kind of what we’re preaching.”
The Eagles are motivated to earn respect on the gridiron while looking to pick up their first conference win this season.
“I don’t think there’s a whole lot we have to do to get them motivated for this one,“noted Shamel. “They know that after the outcome Friday night, we are a playoff-capable team. It’s easier to say that, but we’ve got to go out there, get some things done and prove that to people.
“To get the respect that we feel we deserve, we can’t just go out there and talk it. We’ve got to go out there and win some ball games in our conference and get us a playoff spot. That starts Friday night, and I think these kids are ready to make that statement, get over the hump and maybe take that next step to get into the playoffs.”
Kickoff is set for 7 p.m.