Douglas running back Trevor Kruger looks for running room Thursday at Carson.
It could be difficult to instill confidence into a team that’s about to face a club it lost to 49-7 earlier in the season. But what happened last week doesn’t hurt in that effort.
The Douglas High football team hopes to carry the momentum from its 24-14 win at archrival Carson last Friday into this Friday’s Northern 4A first round playoff game when it will be a heavy underdog at McQueen. Kickoff is 7 p.m.
“We have a lot of hard work to do this week,” Douglas coach Ernie Monfiletto said. “The first thing is getting our kids believing they can do it.”
Douglas (5-4) is coming off a win in which Trevor Kruger had a huge game behind an outstanding effort from the offensive line. Kruger rushed for 261 yards and three touchdowns on 33 carries and piled up 354 total yards.
That bodes well for the Tigers who obviously want to control the ball against McQueen. The best defense for Douglas will be its offense.
“We need to execute a similar game plan to Carson in regards to controlling the football,” Monfiletto said.
“I thought they did extremely well,” Monfiletto added about the offensive line against Carson. “And I thought they played hard. I’m really proud of their effort. I was excited about their performance.”
Douglas will obviously also need to get off to a better start as it can’t afford to fall behind the Lancers 28-0 like in the first meeting.
McQueen (7-2, 2-2) has plenty of weapons on offense with two outstanding running backs in J.D. Kolb and Caleb Ramsey. Kolb gets most of the attention but Ramsey is outstanding in his own right.
The Lancers also have an outstanding dual threat at quarterback in Dominique Stallworth, whose favorite target is D.J. Beckham. Beckham is also a dangerous return man.
Douglas, though, also has plenty of offensive weapons. Colton Weidner is also a dual threat at quarterback for the Tigers. He’s completed 83-of-153 passes for 1,093 yards, 11 touchdowns and three interceptions.
Weidner completed just one pass against Carson, but it was a key 13-yard completion to Race Coman that kept a scoring drive alive in the second half that gave Douglas a 17-7 lead. Weidner has also rushed for 378 yards and three touchdowns.
Kruger is the Tigers’ leading rusher. Weidner’s two favorite targets are Cameron Swain (21 receptions, 274 yards) and Isaiah Geilenfeldt (28 catches, 378 yards).
While Geilenfeldt didn’t have any passes thrown to him against Carson, Monfiletto praised his blocking downfield, which helped spring Kruger on many big runs.
“We’re excited about getting an opportunity to go see McQueen and an opportunity to play them again, absolutely,” Monfiletto said.
