[EKUAlum05]

Now that I have heaped praise on Wayne... who IMHO is the most well rounded team Belfry has faced (they are not as dominant offensively as JC or Bourbon, but they have a better defense than both teams)... it now stands to reason I point out what I have seen that has me salivating potentially for Belfry.

For starters, I feel extremely confident that if Belfry plays a relatively clean game (don't even have to be perfect,, but no catastrophic failures and limit your big penalties or missed tackles to only an isolated incident) that Belfry will bring home the hardware. Obviously this also means a great game plan with defensive penetration and making Wayne One-Dimensional.

Against Bourbon I still did not feel confident in Belfry if both teams brought their A-game because Bourbon had those play makers with either elite speed or athleticism that could potentially score at any moment... I don't see that with Wayne. Johnson Central had the ability to simply maul Belfry with their size up front and let their talented backs hit a home run... that is not Wayne.

I have said all year that unless Belfry stops themselves, there is no 3A team who can stop their offense and I stand by that. Bourbon had a beautiful gameplan to open and had some unbelievable athletes on defense. If you stack the box on Belfry you are beat this year... end of discussion... too much skill in the backfield and Sani is so dangerous with his feet and arm that you will pay the price. Bourbon took a page out of Central's playbook played their LB's back and used their athleticism to diagnose the play and react.. while mixing in different looks to try and create penetration and "guess right". Belfry still racked up over 300 yards.

I like Wayne's defense...they remind me of Belfry in that they are undersized but lightning quick up front and they will pop you... but they are not an especially good tackling team and their LB's don't appear to be nearly as talented as some of the other teams Belfry has faced. Their defense reminds me of some of the better Breathitt County defenses Belfry has faced over the years..the Pirates won't run all over them..but I simply can't see Wayne stopping them all night and Belfry should score enough points that they can win the game from the isolated big play and then a couple sustained drives (3-4 TD's IMO)



I am also seeing a lot of Cards playing both ways. I don't think they have seen a team like Belfry who basically platoons... Central usually comes close to maintaining a platoon system but the Jackets were scraping the barrel a bit this year it seemed.