ADEL —
Two traditionally-strong Region 1-AA football teams will clash in their region openers on Friday night in Adel.
Cook begins the region season against the Thomasville Bulldogs on Friday at Memorial Stadium. The game starts at 7:30 p.m.
“It’s definitely (a big game),” Cook head coach Ken Cofer said. “They’re all big. (In this region) you don’t get a week off. I don’t care (what team we’re playing), you have to be mentally prepared to go through this grind. That’s why we’ve worked on mental toughness since I’ve been here.”
“Our kids are going to be pumped up,” he added.
The Hornets enter the game 3-0 and ranked No. 3 in Class AA. Cook has started its season with three blowout wins, beating Worth County 36-2, Crisp County 37-0 and Dougherty 42-14. Against Dougherty, Cook’s K.J. Edwards scored five touchdowns. All three of Cook’s opponents so far have been AAAA teams. The Hornets were off last week.
“We’ve gotten better every week,” Cofer said. “It took us a while to figure out what our kids could do offensively. We’re more aggressive offensively than we have (been). We’ve got a better running game downhill at folks than we’ve had the past couple of years. ... We’ve played good at times.”
Thomasville has started the season 1-3, but Cofer refuses to take the Bulldogs lightly. He points out that the Bulldogs’ three losses all came to quality opponents (they lost 41-7 to Thomas County Central, a 5A school, 21-0 to Cairo, a 4A school, and 27-17 to Westminster, a AA private school in Atlanta). He believes that this Thomasville team will be just as tough as the Bulldogs’ recent teams, including the one that defeated the Hornets 17-14 in overtime last year in Thomasville.
“They’ve played some good competition,” Cofer said. “I really don’t care if they’ve got a 1-3 record or not. They’re coached well. They get better throughout the year. (Head coach) Richie Marsh and his staff have been together for a while. They play that hard non-region schedule for a reason, to hit their stride when they get into region competition. We’ve definitely got our work cut out for us.”
Thomasville is well known in Region 1-AA for playing tough defense. The Bulldogs sometimes play a 4-3 defensive front and sometimes go with a 4-4 front. Cofer says he is preparing to see both looks on Friday, and that Thomasville will likely adjust its defense to match up against what Cook is doing on offense.
Thomasville ran a flexbone offense for several years, but has now switched to the spread, partially because the Bulldogs have a passing quarterback, Cal King. So Cofer expects to see Thomasville throw the ball more than they have in recent seasons.
And he expects the Bulldogs to be a physical team on both sides of the ball, like they usually are.
What does Cofer think his team must do to win Friday?
“We’re going to play our game, and try to wear them down as the game goes on and stay in the ball game,” he said. “We’ve got to start out faster than we have. ... We need something big to happen in the beginning. We need a turnover, a score quick or something like that, just to get the crowd behind us. I think (our crowd) is going to be big-time behind us at the beginning anyway, but if we can go ahead and get out on top and get some momentum, I think things can go our way.”
Thomasville leads its all-time series with Cook 19-4, but most of the Bulldogs’ wins came when they were a bigger school than Cook. The Hornets have won two of the last three meetings in Adel.
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Related Photos
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Cook’s K.J. Edwards (5) runs the ball against Crisp County earlier this season. Edwards scored five touchdowns in the Hornets’ last game, a 42-14 win over Dougherty on Sept. 13. Mac Ingram | Special to the Times
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