Football Playoffs: Baylor Can Ill-Afford Mistakes Vs. Eagles

For the past two years, Baylor has played its way to the brink of a Division II-2A state football championship, only to come up short.

In 2015, the Red Raiders lost a semifinal showdown to Brentwood Academy 24-7.

The previous year Baylor came up short to Montgomery Bell Academy 31-29, again in the semifinals of the state playoffs.

On Friday, the Red Raiders square off against Brentwood Academy and once more it’s in the semifinal round.

The Eagles dropped Baylor 35-0 on Sept. 16.

The winners advance to the state title game at Tennessee Tech in Cookeville on Dec. 1.

Baylor coach Phil Massey knows exactly what went wrong in the regular-season game and what his team has to correct this time around.

“We can’t have 77 yards of offense or we won’t win,” he said. “Plus, that was compounded with us having four turnovers – a fumble and three picks. They got 21 of their 35 points off our turnovers. That’s what we can’t do this week.”

Elsewhere on Friday games involving Chattanooga-area schools are all in Division I contests.

In Class 3A, East Ridge travels to Dunlap to face the undefeated Sequatchie County Indians in a Class 3A contest, Ooltewah hits the road to challenge Farragut in Class 5A, Marion County is at Forrest in a Class 2A battle of 11-1 title contenders, and once-beaten South Pittsburg tries to derail unbeaten Columbia Academy in Class 1A.

All games start at 7 p.m. local time.

Baylor (8-4) is coming off a 16-12 road victory over No. 1 seed Memphis University School and Massey is hopeful that win will give his Raiders a huge confidence boost.

“First of all,” the veteran coach said, “any time you drive five hours, your kids have to be focused to play. That’s the big takeaway for us in how focused the kids were last week.

“Second, I give kudos to our defense and defensive staff. After giving up the one TD early we pretty much shut them down. They got a third-quarter field goal, but our guys played tremendous defense.

“And, third, offensively we took our shots when we needed to and did a good job moving the chains and scoring some points. We wanted more than field goals, but we scored enough to win the game.”

This marks the third straight time Baylor has reached the semifinals and it has been in the postseason every year since missing out in 2008. Overall, Baylor has reached the semifinals 11 times and made five appearances in the title game.

Baylor’s only TSSAA state championship came in 1973 when the Red Raiders turned back Memphis Hillcrest, 6-0.

After the big win versus undefeated MUS, Massey’s squad now face a team that has been tough Chattanooga’s two II-2A schools – Baylor and McCallie.

The Eagles beat the Blue Tornado twice this season, including last week’s 37-29 quarterfinal win. The Eagles also lay claim to the earlier 35-point smackdown against the Tornado earlier this year.

“Defensively, we didn’t really play that bad in the first game,” Massey said. “Offensively, we didn’t help ourselves at all. We couldn’t run the ball and were ineffective throwing the ball. I think we were still trying to find ourselves at that point.”

Baylor went into that game having won its first five games and outscored those foes – all postseason teams, by the way – by a combined 137-20.

“We’ve done some things since then,” Massey said. “We became more of a pistol, power-run team versus a spread, one-back team. Also, early we didn’t use (wide receiver) Brendan Harrison, a talented kid, that much. He’s been resurrected and is helping our offense as a deep threat.

“He was playing defense and being used sparingly on offense. He’s going both ways now.”

No matter which offense the Raiders are using, they have to secure the ball against the Eagles this week.

More importantly, the coach said, Baylor has to line up with Brentwood and match it man-to-man.

“Psychologically, we have to believe we can compete with them,” Massey said. “We’ve taken some positives steps in that regard by playing well the past few weeks (Baylor has won three in a row). If you’re able to play on the road, and play well, we hope that’ll give us the confidence that we can play with those guys.”

Baylor lost one starter due to injury last week at MUS, starting center/guard Riley Bodine, who won’t play the rest of the season. Two players, Cole Johnson and Sam Beard, will rotate in for Bodine.

Coach Tim James’ Pioneers will be facing their four opponents this season that utilizes a wing-T offense, or a variation of that alignment. Earlier this season East Ridge defended the wing-T in games against Chattanooga Christian, Howard and Polk County.

East Ridge lost to Polk County 35-28 in the season opener, but beat Howard 13-7 and CCS 39-28.

The Indians (12-0) are a different animal.

“They run it as good as anybody we’ve seen, maybe better,” James said. “They’ve put up almost 100 points (98) in two playoff games. We have some familiarity with the wing-T, but everybody runs the offense differently. With Sequatchie, it comes down to their big hosses up front and they’ve done a great job in every film we’ve seen.”

Sequatchie has been hammering foe after foe in 2016. The Indians are averaging 38.75 points per game while allowing just 13.8. They’ve scored at least 42 points in five games, including 61, 56, 50 and 49.

In its two playoff wins, East Ridge put up a combined 62 points.

And James kept going back to the Indians’ offensive line as a key to the Pioneers’ chances of winning.

“From top to bottom, that’s a good football team,” he said. “They’re physical up front and as good as anybody we’ve seen. They’re big and strong; they come off the ball extremely well and just maul people.”

James wasn’t finished with his evaluation of this week’s opponent.

“They have two of the best linebackers I’ve seen in this area in a long time,” said James, referring to Hunter Davenport, a Mr. Football finalist, and Kyle Cates. “They’re running a 3-3 stack, some people call it a 3-5, and they’re running it well.”

East Ridge is coming off a quarterfinal win against Notre Dame, a victory against the region champions that James called “quite rewarding.”

“When you’re one of eight teams in the state in our classification still playing this time of year, you have to be proud of your kids. Sequatchie County is the best team we’ve faced and we hope to keep it respectable. We’re certainly the underdogs.”

TSSAA Playoff Schedule Nov. 18

Division I Quarterfinals

Class 5A

Ooltewah (10-2) at Farragut (11-1)

Class 3A

East Ridge (7-5) at Sequatchie County (12-0)

Class 2A

Marion County (11-1) at Forrest (11-1)

Class 1A

South Pittsburg (11-1) at Columbia Academy (11-0)

Division II-2A

Semifinals

Baylor (8-4) at Brentwood Academy (8-2)

(Contact Larry Fleming at larryfleming44@gmail.com and on Twitter @larryfleming44)