HOWARD – Danville football coach Cameron Smith sees one similarity between his Blue Devils and rival East Knox other than the identical 4-1 records.
“They seem pretty simple offensively— lots of zone (running); lots of simple pass concepts,” Smith said. “That’s what we like to do is simple stuff; find what you’re good at. That’s what they’ve done. Hopefully, we can play into that (because) if we can shut that down, I think we have a pretty good chance.”
Danville hopes to end a two-game losing streak at the hands of the Bulldogs Friday night at Chet Looney Stadium. East Knox won handily 41-7 to finish off the 2019 regular season.
“(Danville is) much improved,” East Knox coach Cody Reese said. “Their kids play hard all four quarters of the game. They're disciplined; they just get after it. They have good athletes on the field. They have motors that never stop. Teams like that are very dangerous to play.”
Even though the Bulldogs have won the last two games in the Devil-Dog rivalry, Reese doesn’t have to think long and hard about where the rivalry was before 2018. Danville holds a 40-22-1 overall record in the series.
“Danville’s always had a lot of success in football,” Reese said. “They consistently do the little things right. They have a lot of fun and play extremely hard.”
One other common between the teams this year is that both have lost to Centerburg. East Knox has won two straight games since a 35-28 double-overtime loss to the Trojans in Week 3.
Most recently, the Bulldogs jumped out to a 42-0 lead by halftime en route to a 56-7 win over Mount Gilead on Sept. 25.
Weston Melick highlighted the effort against Mount Gilead with a pair of receiving touchdowns. He led the offense with 68 yards receiving on three catches and led the defense with six tackles.
“Offensively, he did a good job of finding (open) spaces and catching the ball when given the opportunity,” Reese said. “So he definitely had a really good game for us Friday night.”
Ian Toller turned in another strong performance with 101 yards rushing and two touchdowns on 10 carries, and Shane Knepp caught five passes for 59 yards in the game against Mount Gilead.
“(Consistency is) something we’ve preached since Day 1,” Reese said. “The kids have really picked up on that and tried to be more consistent and do the small things right on a more consistent basis. That’s been a big focus for us and we’re starting to do that more consistently, and that’s led to more success on our behalf.”
Danville has run off four straight wins since a 41-0 loss to Centerburg in Week 1. The Devils are coming off a 29-6 win at home over Highland on Sept. 25.
Kaiden Colopy caught three passes for 103 yards, and Aaron Mezie added 86 yards receiving and a touchdown on five receptions against Highland. Max Payne went 13-for-20 for 208 yards and a pair of touchdowns with no interceptions against the Scots.
Running back Deion Parker rushed for 182 yards and a touchdown on 22 carries in a 14-12 win at Northmor on Sept. 18. Smith thinks that led Highland to key on the run, opening passing lanes for Payne.
“When you rush for 290 yards the week before, you gotta respect the run,” Smith said. “So we spread it back out and found a couple of our other athletes.”