After a decisive win over Carter last week another Knox County foe will travel north to Burley Stadium on Friday night to challenge the Greeneville Greene Devils.
This week, in round two of the Class 4A Playoffs the Gibbs Eagles will be coming to town looking for their 11th win of the season.
Greeneville coach Eddie Spradlen knows that the Eagles (10-1) are a talented squad and that the Devils will have to be prepared for a tough contest on Friday.
“This is going to be a big-time challenge for us on Friday night,” Spradlen said. “Gibbs is a good football team, they’re 10-1. They beat a good Halls team that is still playing. They beat a Fulton team that went toe to toe with Elizabethton last week.”
The Eagles are coming off a 41-10 win over Cherokee in the first round of the playoffs. In that effort running back Brady Hughes ran for 210 yards and scored five total touchdowns. Stopping the powerful tailback will be the primary focus on Friday, but the Devils will have to be ready for a varied offensive attack. In the regular season finale against Fulton Gibbs used eight different ball carriers in a 35-6 win.
“They have an athletic offensive line. The running back has put up a lot of yards and they have good receivers,” Spradlen said. “This is going to be a good challenge for us. We have to be able to control their run game. They run a lot of jet sweeps and they have a really big running back that runs it down hill. They are going to be hard to stop, but we have to limit their big plays in the run game.”
Greeneville enters the game with an 8-2 record and is coming off a 56-7 win over Carter. On October 11 Gibbs beat Carter 42-28. In the win over the Hornets the Devils had one of their best aerial showings of the year with quarterback Caden Baugh going 13-of-15 for 206 yards and four touchdowns. Zaydyn Anderson pulled in three of those touchdowns while accounting for 117 yards. Jeriah Griffin also had five catches and a score.
Mr. Football semifinalist Carson Quillen ran for 112 yards and two touchdowns while becoming Greeneville High School’s all-time leading scorer. Spradlen expects Friday’s game to be won at the line of scrimmage, and he wants to get Quillen going early to open things up for his playmakers on the perimeter.
Friday will likely be the final home game at Burley stadium for Greeneville’s seniors, and Spradlen is hopeful that his squad comes out motivated and that the crowd can give the Devils an advantage one final time. If Elizabethton were to beat Anderson County on Friday and Greeneville beats Gibbs the state quarterfinals would be played in Greeneville. Otherwise, the Devils will be on the road the rest of the way.
“Anytime you play be at home its big, and Burley Stadium is special,” Spradlen said. “The fans and the environment are top notch. It gives us an advantage, but when Gibbs comes in here they will give it all they have. This senior class has won a lot of football games here. They want to keep playing, and getting one more win in here means a lot to them.”
Greeneville and Gibbs have met in the second round of the playoffs each of the past two seasons. In 2022 the Devils won 58-28, and in 2023 it was a 42-0 Greeneville victory. In total Greeneville and Gibbs have met on the gridiron six times. In 1929 Gibbs won 6-0, in every other contest Greeneville has won by 30 or more points.
