After a 47-14 loss to start the season Friday night at home against Flomaton, the W.S. Neal Eagle football team will begin region play this Friday on the road at UMS-Wright.
UMS-Wright comes into the game with the Eagles with an 0-1 record after falling 31-0 to McGill-Toolen last week.
While both teams are winless coming into week two, W.S. Neal Eagle head coach Doug Hoehn said his team has to play better football than they did against Flomaton.
“We played very sloppy,” Hoehn said of the 33-point loss to the Hurricanes. “We had way too many penalties, some of which were very costly. They came at the worst possible time. We had a penalty on fourth down when Flomaton was punting and we roughed the punter. Then we had a third-and-long and we roughed the quarterback. Those are mistakes you can’t make. Then we had too many turnovers.”
This week, the Eagles will take on UMS-Wright in Mobile to start region play. The shutout of the Bulldogs last week against McGill-Toolen was the first time the Bulldogs were shutout since 2007. That shutout also came against McGill-Toolen.
In the loss Friday night, UMS-Wright had 168 total yards and was led by running back Troy Dixon.
Hoehn said the Bulldogs, under head coach Terry Curtis, are a good football team.
“We just have the one film on them and the one film I have, they will be our toughest opponent yet,” Hoehn said. “They are a well-coached team and they do not make a lot of mistakes. They are not going to line up wrong, they are not going to give you anything for free. It will be a tough test for us.”
Hoehn said the key to winning was the same as it was last week.
“We can’t have turnovers and penalties,” Hoehn said. “Penalties put you behind the chains and it changes your play calling. It changes what you want to do and puts you in positions that are tough to overcome. Especially turnovers on your end of the field as it gives your opponent a short field to work with. We have to limit penalties and turnovers and we have to play more focused. We were a little too excited Friday night. We are a young team and it was the kid’s first game and hopefully we will learn from this. When you are that excited, you cannot be focused and do your assignments.”
Game time is set for 7 p.m. on the campus of UMS-Wright in Mobile.