Marching Orders: Centre must right the ship, chart a new course- @CentreFootball @minguabeefjerky @1776Bank @HopkinsCentral

Colonels slip to 0-2, will travel to Memphis for first conference match with 2-0 Rhodes

The real season begins and, as badly as we have looked to date, none of the non-conference effort matters. The SAA conference play begins with Centre on the road to Rhodes and, for all intents and purposes, all conference teams have the same record. If we can get this thing turned around and manage to play good football in the conference season, we can make this 0-2 start a comical “remember when…” situation. Here’s to holding out hope the Colonels start playing to the teams ability and fulfilling its destiny.

HB Lyons, Scouting Director, KPGFootball

Yesterday, the Colonels fell flat on its collective faces playing a Maryville College team excited about its now being 2-0, out of the gate, for the ’23 season. The Colonels have dropped to 0-2 in a score which was even more lopsided than the final indicates.

The Colonels lost 34-23 yesterday in the mountains of eastern Tennessee. There were still a handful of bright spots in an otherwise dismal team performance.

Jack Gohmann, a 6’4,” 200 pound sophomore was able to make some plays in the downfield passing-game. His efforts put a few cosmetic touches on a dismal afternoon.

Gohmann completed nine (9)-passes yesterday (in 14-attempts, for a 63% completion rate). One of his completions was for a TD.

Gohmann compiled 182-yards of passing. Gohmann had a long of 53-yards, coming off the bench.

There were some other bright spots. Cam Tegge, in the second quarter, hit a 42-yards FG. That conversion from that distance is the longest FG the Junior has hit thus far in his fine Centre career.

Ethan Mays, a 6’5,” 228-pound sophomore TE from Louisville’s Male High, recorded his first TD of his career. He caught a TD toss following the game’s second weather delay.

Senior, Christian Biliter, led the Colonels with 95-receiving yards. Fifty-three (53) of those yards came via a catch of that length in the fourth quarter. That was the longest pass completion of the day for either team.

Scotty Brown finished with a game high eight (8) catches. He had 90-yards receiving and a fourth quarter TD. Brown also blocked an extra point try in the third quarter.

Parker Guillaume completed his fine play defensively. Guillaume paced the defense with six (6) tackles. Dallas Douglas had four (4) tackles, three (3) TFL’s, a sack, and a caused fumble.

We now turn our attention to Rhodes College. Rhodes (the Lynx) are 2-0 on the year. The Lynx have beaten Westminster (Mo.), 47-0, and Austin College, 19-17 yesterday.

Needless to say the defense appears to be playing well, surrendering only 17-points in two ballgames. Let’s not forget this Rhodes team, on Nov. 12, 2022, beat Birmingham Southern, 20-3 possibly knocking BSU out of an NCAA bid.

BSU entered that game 7-2, with a 5-1 conference mark, and a chance at either an automatic or an at-large bid. They left that game headed home for the offseason.

Rhodes is playing well, particularly on defense. Lets look at some of the offensive performances first.

Against the Roos, Rhodes was 100% on 4th down (4 for 4) and had 19-first downs, 15 passing. Rhodes also had 327-yards of total offense in 76-plays, 4.3-yards per play.

Rhodes is dangerous in the passing game, netting 262-yards through the air yesterday. The Lynx have not yet proven particularly a force with which to reckon on the ground. Their net 65 yards rushing against Austin College would certainly stand as a testament.

Houston Wilhelm was 28 for 45 through the air yesterday for Rhodes, throwing 2-TD’s but 3-INT’s. No one among the running backs was particularly effective, but Elijah Bane got the lion’s share of the work-load.

Bane was effective swinging out of the backfield in the passing game. Bane caught 10-passes for 63-yards. John Hampton and Andrew Pickens caught the two TD’s, one each.

The Rhodes defense has been playing very well. The Lynx sacked the QB, yesterday, 4-times.

Evan Byrd and Jason Kusibab paced the defense with 9-stops a piece. Conroy Thomas is a riddle offensive fronts have struggled to solve so far this season.

Thomas had two of the Lynx’s four sacks against the Roos and a pair of TFL’s. Hart Penfield and Minh Giang concluded the sack parade, each having a sack. Giang also had two (2)-TFL’s while Penfield managed one.

Synopsis:

If you are looking for bottom lines, we have one for you. First of all, we can’t keep being this inconsistent on the offensive side of the football and expect to meet with different results than our present winless record.

We aren’t pointing at any one player here. We win together, we lose together.

We also need to work harder on having a more formidable pass rush. We defend the run fine, but we aren’t getting much pressure on the QB in obvious passing situations, as it looked that way, to this author, in watching the game yesterday.

There has been no blood drawn yet. We go to Memphis and fall on our faces and we will be singing a much different tune; but, we could still run through the conference slate and sit around, sipping cocktails at the tailgate, musing about a slow start not really hampering a very fine season.

Here’s to hoping! See you at the tailgate.

This is Fletcher W. Long, reporting for KPGFootball, reminding you to PLAY THROUGH THE WHISTLE!

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