The Chuckey-Doak football team will be road warriors once again on Friday night, this time heading to Claiborne for another important Region 1-3A contest.
“This is another long road trip over the mountain,” Chuckey-Doak coach Billy Kaylor said. “And we have to go up there and try to get a win this week against a good Claiborne team. It’s going to be a tough ballgame, but we need to get another region win to put ourselves in the playoff position we want to be in.”
Last week the Black Knights went to Johnson County and picked up their first Region 1-3A win of the season, 34-18. Now they make the trip to New Tazewell looking to strengthen their playoff positioning.
Right now, Chuckey-Doak sits at 1-1 in league and would like to get a leg on a second team with four of the six teams in the region advancing to the playoffs.
Unicoi County is currently 3-0 in league play, Gatlinburg-Pittman is 2-1, Johnson County 1-1 and Pigeon Forge 0-2.
Claiborne is 0-5 on the year and 0-2 in league play. Last week the Bulldogs fell to Gatlinburg-Pittman 54-12. The only common opponent on the schedules is Johnson County, who beat Claiborne 28-19 on September 18.
The Bulldogs are giving up 45.2 points per game and scoring 10.6 points per game.
The Black Knights lead the all-time series with the Bulldogs 14-11, including a 19-13 last-second win in Afton last year. The last time Chuckey-Doak went to Claiborne the Bulldogs prevailed 39-13.
The Black Knights expects to see a powerful rushing attack from the Bulldogs. Claiborne will spread the ball around in the backfield with quarterback Noah Burke, and running backs Jason Dyer and Colton Brewer splitting carries. Last week against Gatlinburg the Bulldogs managed just 153 yards of total offense.
“They run the football well, and I think that that is something they hang their hat on. They have a quarterback that runs it well and a couple of powerful backs we have to be ready for,” Kaylor said.
Chuckey-Doak comes into the contest boasting a balanced offense, but Kaylor does expect Claiborne to load the box in an effort to stop the run. A week ago that rushing attack saw three players gain 50 or more yards on the ground with Brayden Greene getting into the endzone while Marcus Britt and Zaiden Schacke both had productive days.
In the pass game against the Longhorns Brody Myers and Kiptyn Ball each threw a touchdown pass while Skylar Davis and Braxton Lowe had receiving touchdowns. Through six games Kaylor feels good about his two-quarterback system that keeps the defense guessing with both passers frequently on the field at the same time.
Kickoff for Friday’s contest is scheduled for 7 PM from New Tazewell.
