Good Hope, Clay County bring win streaks into game

By Brandon Shields

November 17, 2006 01:20 am

— GOOD HOPE — Clay County comes into the game with Good Hope with an impressive resume that boasts of 25 consecutive wins, a Class 2A state championship and wins that proved the Panthers’ dominance over the competition.
However, Good Hope head coach Chris Moss said his team’s record over the past two seasons is nothing to take for granted.
“We started off kind of slow last year with a 1-4 record,” Moss said. “But we came back in the second half of the season and went 4-1 before losing in the playoffs.
“Add that to the 10-1 record we have this season so far, and we have won 13 of our last 16 games. Both teams bring a lot of success into this game, and ours is because our players will not accept losing.”
Moss said his players will not accept a loss this week, and their work during practice has proven it. They just have to play an excellent game to try to come out with a win.
“Clay County is a very good high school football team,” Moss said. “We will have to play mistake-free football to give ourselves a chance, because Clay County is big and fast. You don’t see too many teams that are both big and fast very often.”
Clay County has not had many close games all season as the Panthers have rolled to an 11-0 record coming into the game.
The closest they have come to losing was their regular season finale against Class 5A Benjamin Russell, whom Clay County defeated 29-28, but Moss said BRHS would have won that game if it were not for mistakes.
“Benjamin Russell had the lead in the last minute and just needed to punt the ball away,” Moss said. “Then they messed up the punt, and the punter kicked the ball out of bounds deep in Benjamin Russell’s territory.
“Clay County had just enough time to run a couple of plays to get close and kick a field goal with a couple of seconds left to win the game.”
Moss said the Raiders may attack Clay County’s secondary, the Panthers’ weak point, but Moss said Clay County has been able to come back from it so far.
“Sheffield tried to pass it on them last week, and it worked at times when they got it to the tight end,” Moss said. “We’ll try different things to see what works and then attack where we think we’ll have the best chance to beat them.”
Kickoff is set for 7 p.m. tonight in Ashland.