MHS to open football conference play at Riverview

By Kevin Black and Sean Cavender
UCA sportswriting

The Mayflower Eagles will begin 3A-2 conference play against the Riverview Raiders on Friday, Sept. 25 at Mayflower.

Mayflower is coming into this game 0-3, but it won the league last year with a 7-0 conference record, finishing 10-2.

The Eagles’ non-conference competition this fall helped to get them prepared for conference, according to Mayflower coach Jed Davis.

“We played up in classification for our non-conference game,” Davis said. “ We played (Class 4A) Clarksville, (Class 5A) Greenbrier, so we feel like we play a tougher non-conference schedule than most teams.”

Playing up a classification gives the team morale, according to Davis.

“It’s not going to make us any better playing teams that are worse than us,” he said. “We have to play good competition so we know exactly where we stand.”

Demetris Lasker, one of Mayflower's tailbacks, agreed.

"We played the hardest non-conference games, so we should be ready,” he said.

The Eagles have improved substantially since the season started, according to Davis.

“We found the mistakes that we had to fix and that’s what we’ve been doing,” he said.

The Raiders (2-1) finished last year with a 5-6 overall record.

“They are very athletic,” Davis said. “They’ve got some running backs and receivers that are very fast and athletic.”

Lasker said stopping the Raiders’ offensive threat would be key in an Eagle victory.

“They have two good running backs and they run hard and we’ll just make sure our linebackers come up and come hard,” Lasker said.

A strong performance by the offensive line could get the Eagles their first victory of the season, according to Lasker.

“Our line needs to block really hard," he said. "We’ve been working on that, and if we get receivers blocking so we can run the ball hard, we should win,” Lasker said.

The Eagles are looking forward to having home field advantage this Friday night, Davis said.

“We expect a big crowd here at Mayflower," he said. "The community is always really good about coming out and supporting us, and we’re excited about starting off our conference at home."

Kickoff is set for 7 p.m. at Patrick Stadium.