Coming off a 42-0 shutout win over Excel last Friday to improve to 2-1 overall and to 1-1 in region play, the T.R. Miller Tiger football will take to the road Friday to face off against Montgomery Academy—a team they shutout last year.
T.R. Miller Tiger head coach Jamie Riggs said the win over the Panthers of Excel was a good way to bounce back after losing to Bayside Academy in week two.
“There were a couple of good things that happened,” Riggs said. “No. 1, I thought we got after them to start the game. We made some things happen early and we were able to get them stopped and make them punt. Then we were able to score and get the ball in a couple times early in the first quarter and that helped to get the offensive off to a good start. The bad part was the lull before halftime. We had a chance to put more points up and we didn’t do that. We can’t do that against good teams. You will lose the opportunities so we are fortunate to get by on that.”
Riggs said the scoring of the first series of the second half was good for his team as well.
“That helped a lot,” Riggs said. “If you have a 21-0 lead at halftime and you come out there and score first, it is 28-0. If they score first, its 21-7 and they are pumped up and you have yourself a game. Your ability to come out and do that has a lot to do with it, but we played well.”
Montgomery Academy comes into the game with the Tigers with a 2-1 record, falling to Bayside Academy Friday night 53-10.
“First of all, MA is a young team,” Riggs said. “There offense starts with their quarterback, No. 12 Joshua Thomas. He is a freshman. He is an outstanding player. He throws the ball well and they let him run the ball a lot. We better find an answer to him because if we don’t, it will be a long night. Just looking, I think he plays really well, especially since he is a freshman. He shows lots of poise and maturity to be so young.”
On defense, Riggs said MA plays a couple different fronts.
“The one thing I see about them is they are really aggressive,” Riggs said. “They will stunt you a good bit and they have some really aggressive players. We need to bow up and block them some. I think the big issue for us is to take care of the ball. If we hold on to the ball, we can keep it away from their quarterback so he won’t get 60 or 70 snaps.”
Game time is set for 7 p.m. in Montgomery.