Montezuma Braves football Coach Pat O’Brien called having a bye through the first round of the playoffs “a blessing and a curse” when KGRN’s Chris Varney interviewed him.
A curse, “because I’ve always believed it’s hard to beat a team twice,” O’Brien said.
The blessing: It allows the Braves to turn inward. And there’s all kinds of good stuff there.
“We can focus on ourselves,” the coach said. “Our mindset has to be to continue to go 1-0 and not look ahead,” O’Brien said.
“Can we do our reads better? Can we put more tools in our shed?”
Montezuma was a 62-24 winner over Lone Tree on Oct. 9, hitting the Lions with a 33-point third quarter after a comparatively sluggish start.
The second round playoff game starts at 7 p.m. on Friday, Oct. Oc. 23 at Badger-Gabriel Field.
Lone Tree has some speed in its skill positions. The Lions threw for 186 yards ans rushed for 137 when the teams met the first time. They were the first team to throw for more than 82 yards in a game against the Braves.
“We wound up with four interceptions against Lone Tree, so we started shrinking our gaps,” O’Brien said.
“We struggled in the first half because I thought we were hugging, not tackling,” he said.
The Braves scored on all but two possessions against the Lions. Those two were ended by interceptions.
“We’re really coming around,” O’Brien said. “We had 263 yards rushing. Our linemen are holding their blocks. It couldn’t happen without a team effort.”
A glance at statistics reveals how demonstrably better the Braves are on defense compared with a year ago.
True, the caliber of the opposition differs from year to year. But check out a few of these numbers:
Last season, the Braves gave up 53 points a game. This year, the defensive yield is 22 points per outing.
Last year, teams passed for 115 yards per game.
This year, opponents are throwing for 71 yards per game.
In 2019, opponents rushed for 344 yards a game and 7.04 per rush.
This year, foes have rushed for 203 yards a game and 5.58 yards per rush.
This year, the Braves are achieving field position and getting stops – turning the ball over for Montezuma’s high-powered offense, which appears to be a storm still gathering strength.
UP NEXT – Lone Tree (4-3) vs. Montezuma (7-0), at 7 p.m. on Friday at Badger-Gabriel Field.
