Warriors ready to hit road

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September 9, 2010

By Jamie Wachter / Sports Editor The Meridian Star The Meridian Star Thu Sep 09, 2010, 06:00 AM CDT

MERIDIAN —     East Central Community College coach Brian Anderson is anxious.

   After last week’s dismal performance in the Warriors’ home and season opener, the first-year head coach can’t wait to see the response when ECCC travels to Senatobia today to face Northwest Mississippi Community College at Ranger Stadium.

Northwest also won the last meeting between the two schools, a 14-12 decision also in Senatobia.

   “I’m excited to see how we’re going to respond,” he said.

   The Warriors shot themselves in the foot, losing four fumbles in the game. Those are problems Anderson is hoped are fixed, at least in part, due to ECCC finally being a complete team. The Warriors had been missing four starters due to injuries over the past week.

Those limited reps didn’t help a young team’s rhythm in the 34-6 loss against Northeast Mississippi Community College last week at Bailey Stadium.

   “The big thing is we’ve got all of our players back,” he said. “It’s hard to get any kind of continuity and it’s hard to play when you don’t practice. We’ve had a better week of practice this week and I think we got rid of some first-game jitters. I think some of our freshmen got welcomed to college football a little bit and I expect them to respond this week and play better.”

   In upsetting Pearl River 27-17 last week, the No. 15 Rangers got 213 passing yards from freshman quarterback Brent Osborn, who completed 18 of 30 passes for two touchdowns. Calvin Malone led Northwest with 82 yards rushing and one touchdown.

Meanwhile, East Central allowed 271 passing yard to the Tigers, although the Warriors did limit Northeast to just 46 yards rushing.

   “Everybody in this league is good,” Anderson said. “Everybody has players and everybody in this league can beat anybody on any given night. There’s not much difference as far as that goes.”

   East Central, though, will face a stout rushing defense in Northwest, which held Pearl River to minus-4 yards rushing on 19 attempts. Quarterback Blake Matherne was ECCC’s top rusher with 66 yards, he also threw for 176 yards on 14 of 22 passing with a 24-yard touchdown to Walter Grayson. Northwest did allow 348 yards passing to Pearl River.

   “Bad things happen during the course of a football game,” Anderson added. “Usually you don’t get that many bad things happen in one game. I think we just had a ton of bad things happen to us. And the good thing is, our guys didn’t quit. We came out and moved the football and we got seven three-and-outs in the second half.”

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