By By Matthew Nascone
When the Escambia Academy Cougars football team travels to Butler they will face a challenge in the form of the Patrician Academy Saints. According to EA head coach Heath Gibson, the Saints are a good team.
"They were runner-up for the state title last year and they have a very balanced team," Gibson said.
He said Patrician (1-0) will run the ball half the time and pass it half the time.
"They are a 50-50 team and that will be hard to stop," Gibson said. "But we will try to confuse them with different looks."
At times the Cougars (1-0) will put six players in the box and drop some out into coverage and at other times they will start with three in the box and bring the house on a blitz.
Gibson said the Saints have a talented tailback in Barry Meeks and they like to run the halfback direct snap to catch teams off guard.
"They love to run the trap and they will run everything out of the trap," he said. "I was really impressed with Meeks when I watched him on film."
Patrician's quarterback will be another player to keep an eye on.
"He takes control of the offense and he knows what he is doing out there," Gibson said.
The two teams last played three years ago and Patrician won 22-13. But Gibson said he told his players that they need to cut down on the penalties if they want to win Friday.
"The biggest key is for us to play every snap as hard as possible and execute when we have the ball," Gibson said.