SportsZone Football Friday game of the week preview: Rock Bridge vs. Battle
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
As the regular season begins to wind down, there are still some big matchups to get to including week seven's cross-town game between Rock Bridge and Hickman.
Watch the game live at 7 p.m. in the player.
These two teams will Friday in the KZOU game of the week. You can watch the game live on KZOU over the air channel 17.3 at 7 p.m. Here is a look at other local listings:
- DirecTV - channel 18
- Dish Network - channel 32
- Mediacom - channel 12, 709
- Centurylink - channel 12
- Spectrum - channel 183
Battle got its second win of the season in week six with a 50-15 win over Smith-Cotton which was the most points that the offense has put up all season and the least given up by the defense.
"We've made some personnel changes on offense and defense trying to be more efficient," said head coach Jonah Dubinski. "I think last week our guys really took to it and the results showed, but we have to start faster on offense. Moving the ball doesn't really matter if it doesn't result in points."
With Battle starting off the season with three straight losses, Dubinski said he has made sure his team is focused on the positives that they can take away from every game.
"We just try to focus on playing the game one play at a time," Dubinski said. "That means every game there's going to be instances when you do that and every game there's going to be instances where you don't do that so just focus on the singular event of one play at a time."
When talking about Rock Bridge, Dubinski says, "they are a phenomenally talented team."
"They're loaded with talent and they play a quality disciplined football in all three phases and they've got the talent to match, so it's a good opponent," Dubinski said.
In Rock Bridge's first season under head coach Matt Perkins, the Bruins have gone on a tear. After losing week one, they have won five straight including week six's 42-13 win against Lutheran St. Charles.
"We've been really fortunate with injuries to be healthy week in and week out and I think it's important that we stay injury free," Perkins said. "I think we do a good job of practicing with good tempo and with a good pace to keep our kids healthy and safe, so that's going to be important moving forward is keeping the depth where we have it."
With the win streak right now, Perkins said it's all about keeping the momentum going into the playoffs.
"We're just a step better every single week. I think we had our best three weeks of practice back to back to back coming into this week and I'm hoping this week will be more of the same," Perkins said.
Perkins said Battle has "a ton of fire power offensively" and have lost several close games.
"They're a good football team that hasn't probably played a full four quarter game yet as well as they'd like to and I know they're going to be ready for us on Friday and we're going to have to play a good game to beat them," Perkins said.
Rock Bridge will meet Battle at Battle High School Friday at 7 p.m.
