Pat O’Brien of Montezuma and Jerod Burns of BGM sound a little more like members of a mutual admiration society than generals about to send their troops to war against each other.
“They are extremely dynamic . . . explosive . . .and really balanced,” said Burns about Montezuma.
“They have a very physical and experienced line. They are going to come at us and punch us in the mouth,” said O’Brien about BGM.
Now, that’s talk that some of the older folks in both communities can understand and even appreciate.
And take literally? Well, let’s hope not.
But this DOES figure to be an intense third round game of the Class 8 football playoffs. It starts at 7 p.m. Friday, Oct. 30, at Badger-Gabriel Field in Montezuma.
The winner will go to the quarterfinals, against the winner of Easton Valley (8-1) and Gladbrook-Reinbeck (9-0). The higher seed of the two survivors will get to host.
BGM (8-1) and Montezuma (8-0) were arch rivals for a long time. In fact, the Bears have won eight of the previous 11 games they’ve played. The Braves have won the last three. But they haven’t met each other since 2017, when both schools were still playing 11-man football.
The speed in Montezuma’s receiving corps has drawn Burns’ attention. The physical nature and experience of BGM’s down linemen has O’Brien’s on alert.
“They’re much faster than we are,” Burns told Chris Varney of KGRN radio, regarding Montezuma’s wideouts. “So how do you defend them?” Varney wondered aloud. “I don’t know,” Burns said. “But we’ll at least have a plan drawn up by late in the week.”
“We’ll go over and play as hard as we can,” Burns said. “We’re known for being really physical. I hope that’s a strength for us.”
O’Brien has no doubts about BGM’s promise of being physical. “For us, on defense and offense, they have a very physical and experienced line,” Montezuma’s coach said. “We have to be ready to take a hit and move forward.”
What happens when the Braves move forward is an unknown for Burns. “They’re athletic and big,” Burns said about the Braves. “We haven’t had to block a big defensive line like this.”
But they have blocked most of them. The only BGM loss was 20-6 to 9-0 Gladbrook-Reinbeck, which runs the ball on almost every play.
Burns wasn’t thrilled with his team’s line play in last Friday’s 22-20 win over HLV. A late score gave the Bears the lead. HLV had a chance to win with a field goal, but time expired before the snap.
“We have to try and limit Montezuma’s big plays, especially in the first half,” Burns said. “We have got to give ourselves a chance to win in the second half.”
“BGM is a tremendous team and has played great all season,” O’Brien said. “It’s going to be great to see how we measure up against them.”
“BGM wins its games by controlling line play,” O’Brien said. “They’ll run 12 running plays in a row at you, then hit that fade over the top.”
The Montezuma coach thinks Bears quarterback Jacob Mauer, “does a tremendous job of reading and setting the tone. We need to keep him between the tackles.”
“They have an experienced offensive line that gets into its blocks and sustains them,” O’Brien said. “We have a younger defensive line. We have to set the edge and maintain.”
“Both teams,” O’Brien said, hang our hats on doing the things we do well.”
“We have to be ready for onside kicks, fake punts and fake field goals,” O’Brien said.
“We hope our front five and front three can move people around” Burns said. “Our guys are excited to play,” said the coach.
“We need to set the tone at the line of scrimmage offensively, and flow to the ball defensively,” said Montezuma’s coach.
Said Burns: “We don’t want to leave with any regrets.”
STEPPING UP – Linebacker Tanner Wright, the leader of BGM’s defense, played in the first half against HLV, but not the second. Burns told Varney on his Tuesday, Oct. 27 program, that Wright’s status was “day-to-day.” Jacob Moel stepped into Wright’s position and came up with 11.0 tackles against HLV.
NAMES AND STATS – Of some of the key performers in this contest are in a story posted here earlier this week.
THE BIG BROADCAST – Grinnell-based Energy 106.7 FM has announced they will do a live radio broadcast of the game.
THE WINNER FRIDAY – Advances to next week’s quarterfinals.
