After three straight weeks of region play that saw the T.R. Miller Tigers go 2-1 in that span, the No. 8-ranked team in 3A (as of Tuesday) will welcome 4A’s No. 7 team, the Andalusia Bulldogs, to Brewton this Friday night.
T.R. Miller improved to 3-1 overall and to 2-1 in region play Friday night in Montgomery as they cruised to a 62-14 win over the Montgomery Academy Eagles.
T.R. Miller Tiger head coach Jamie Riggs said he was proud to get the win Friday.
“We got to play a lot of people and that was good,” Riggs said. “For the most part, we did not do a good job after we got the lead. In the second quarter (up 21-0 after the first quarter), we had some drives stopped where we kind of stopped ourselves. We made some errors on defense and that allowed them to score some points down there. I was just not very pleased at halftime. We let them come back a little bit. But, we did come back in the third quarter and take control of the game. Overall, it was a good victory.”
As for this week, the Tigers return home after two weeks on the road and will take on 4-0 Andalusia. The Tigers won last year 22-6 over the Bulldogs to hand Andalusia their only loss in the regular season.
This season, the Bulldogs are outscoring their opponents 156-44 while T.R. Miller is outscoring theirs 166-63.
“Nobody has really come close to them yet,” Riggs said of the Bulldogs. “Obviously they have a good team and we know that from playing them last year. They have a lot of outstanding players on their team starting with No. 5 Jacard Townsend. He is a linebacker and is an outstanding player. We will have to deal with him to win.”
Riggs said the Bulldogs have great team speed.
“They do a great job of running the ball,” Riggs said. “They are very physical when they run. So, we have our work cut out for us. We have to find some answers to those things. If we can find an answer to their running game and deal with Townsend, and get them blocked, they are just aggressive on defense. We just have to find an answer to get them blocked. If we do, hopefully we can hang in there until the end of the game. If not, we will have great difficulty with them. They have scored some big points. They are a good team and this will be a tough game.”
With the halfway point of the season upon us, Riggs said he had hoped for improvement from his team, but has not saw it.
“I am a little disappointed that I have not seen improvement from them yet,” Riggs said. “I have seen some in some areas, but I have not seen as I would like to see. We still have a lot of work in front of us. If you want to beat good teams, you have to keep improving every week and right now the improvement for us is not where I would like for it to be.”
One team that did see improvement each week and in the playoffs will be honored this Friday night as the 1991 state championship team will be recognized for their 20-year reunion.
“We are excited about that,” Riggs said. “We are glad to get those guys back. That was certainly one of our greatest teams. When you go 14-0 that is pretty good. Fourteen games is all we could play that year and they won the championship game by 40 points so that was a group that made a playoff run and got better each week.”
Riggs said there were some good teams in 4A that year.
“We beat Daleville who had a really good team and Pike County had a good team,” Riggs said. “We won four playoff games against really good teams. Handley was expected to win the championship and Deshler had won 28 in a row and was the defending state champion. There were other teams that were good in north Alabama that year. For us to have won the championship that year was a pretty amazing feat just because of the tough competition that year. We will enjoy getting all them back and reliving that year. We have a nice crowd coming back and we want to honor them.”
A tailgate and team recognition will be held before the game and a lunch and video ceremony will be held Saturday for the team.
Game time is set for 7 p.m. Friday night in Brewton at Brewton Municipal Stadium.