[PHSForever]

Crider and Pugh is an excellent comparison and very fair, FWIW

I will say though that Pikeville had better secondary options than Crider had with Graves. It truly was an one man show.

Battaile is a much better QB than Graves' and the Charles boys were an upgrade at their positions.

That Graves team is one of the weakest teams to reach the State Finals in recent years (especially for non-1A teams)..I still cannot fathom how they upset Bowling Green who was clearly the best team in 5A IMHO last year. Goes to show how any team can lose on a given night.

Exactly. That's why, IMO only, that while it was a great accomplishment for Mayfield to hold him under 100, being that he was the whole show basically, that made it somewhat easier to focus on shutting him down. I'm NOT knocking Mayfields defense, just saying it's easier to shut a team down when they don't have a variety of options that have to be respected. THATS why I think Pikeville would have beaten Mayfield this year. We did an excellent job of establishing other players after the Belfry game, and from that point on, became a more well rounded team and it allowed Pugh, Slone, Vanderbeck, the Charles boys, etc to flourish even more. Of course, without the line, nothing happens. Those boys were rocks this year.