Bears collide with Kinkaid on Thursday

The Little Cypress Mauriceville Bears started a five-game home stand last week with a thrilling victory. This week the Bears play a strong private school from the city of Houston.

The rivalry between LCM and Bridge City is an intense one, and last Friday was one of the best games in that series. The Bears and the Cardinals exchanged the lead four times in the fourth quarter with the home town Bears holding on for a 30-23 win.

Little Cypress Mauriceville earned their nickname the Battlin' Bears according to their coach Eric Peevey. "For a young team to get down late in the game like that a lot of kids would have hung their head, but the Bears came back. It was just one of those games where I felt like we played well with over four hundred yards of offense and defensively we held Bridge City under a hundred yards total offense until the last big throw they made. We played a great game, but we played very sloppy when it comes to penalties. That's the thing with football not everything can you control, so get your mind right and let's go do our job the next play," Peevey emphasized.

Jackson Smith played a huge role for the Bears in the triumph. After the Cardinals scored a touchdown to take the lead on a long pass Smith blocked the point after kick. On the ensuing kickoff from Bridge City Jackson found a big hole created by his Bear blockers and returned the ball seventy yards to setup the eventual winning score.

Peevey pointed out how Smith lived up to the motto it's about the next play not the last play. Peevey explained, "We called a coverage and Smith missed it resulting in the Cardinal touchdown. Last year as a sophomore Jackson probably would have hung his head, but instead this year as a junior that played eleven games last year as one of our leaders on the team, what does he do, he blocks the extra point and then he turns around, catches the kickoff and runs the ball back to give us the chance to make a comeback."

The LCM offense was really clicking excluding the penalties both running and throwing the ball. "I'm just real proud of quarterback Dylan Payne and how far he's come in our offense. We were able to get the ball to our running backs a little bit more and spread it out offensively to the multiple receivers. I felt like we were moving the ball really well on offense we just had too many false starts, holding penalties, and fumbles," Peevey analyzed.

The homestand continues on Thursday night this week for Little Cypress Mauriceville. The opponent will be the private school out of Houston the Kinkaid Falcons.

Despite the school's nickname of the Falcons the Kinkaid offense is heavy in their ground game. The Falcons want to run the football over their opponents.

Kinkaid will play with the tight end and sometimes two tight ends. The Falcons will use seven linemen in tight, but then will spread things with five wide outs. They will usually run the play clock down to just a few seconds before snapping the ball and getting a few yards on the ground then doing it again and again.

Peevey indicated, "They basically can line up in anything on God's green earth. They have the numbers to do it. They have multiple running backs, they use a two quarterback system, they have multiple receivers, but it all really comes down to their running game. They're going to try to run the ball and be physical the same thing they did last year."

Falcon running back Pierce Morrell is a big physical kid. Kinkaid may not have any game breakers at the skill positions like they did last year. "They have a lot of production out of multiple players on their team," Peevey commented.

The offensive line as might be expected is very large for Kinkaid. Peevey noted, "Big tight ends so we'll definitely be the smaller ones in this contest."

The defense for Kinkaid is very aggressive. They run a 3-4 front and also will get into a four-man front, but the Falcons are going to bring a lot pressure.

"The Falcons hang their hat on their defense. Their offense kind of does what it needs to do, but their defense is what wins the games for them. They're going to bring a lot of pressure," Peevey emphasized.

Linebacker Read Liuzzi is an absolute animal according to Peevey. Liuzzi averages close to twenty tackles a game and is all over the field.

The Falcon secondary will use a lot of man coverage. Cornerback George Kugle locked up the Jasper Bulldog receivers he was assigned in Week 1 pretty much shutting them out as far as receptions in his area.

Peevey reiterated, "The Kinkaid defense is very aggressive and they're very good. I think that is the strength of their team, so we're going to definitely have to a great job picking up all these blitzes and moving the ball around."

Since Coach Peevey came to Little Cypress Mauriceville three seasons ago the Houston Kinkaid Falcons have been on the Bears' schedule. LCM won the first meeting and the Falcons won last year so this will be the sort of rubber game of the series between the two teams since Peevey's arrival.

The Bears were caught off balance during the last meeting with the Falcons by the physicalness of Kinkaid, so the LCM coaches are gearing up their players for a physical contest against the Falcons. "We've got to be prepared for the Falcons' style of play which is a physical brand of football with a very aggressive defensive," Peevey concluded.

The Little Cypress Mauriceville Bears face the Houston Kinkaid Falcons on Thursday night. The game is scheduled to begin at seven.