Lawton High football coach Ryan Breeze met with The Lawton Constitution’s Kevin Green ahead of the Wolverines’ huge District 6A-II-1 meeting with No. 1 Stillwater.
Breeze discussed a variety of topics, including the Putnam City West win, the injury report, practicing in rainy conditions and what he’s expecting from the Pioneers.
Week 6 debrief
A 21-point win looks nice, especially when it gets your team 15 district points.
However, despite LHS’s 42-21 win over PC West last week, Breeze said it was far from the Wolverines’ best performance, especially on offense.
“Offensively, we got sloppy,” Breeze said. “We had a couple of drops, had a couple of poor routes and a couple of rushed throws. It wasn’t our best night. We were looking at some new things, and some of it looked OK, and some of it didn’t. We tried to get the jet sweep going to Chateau (Reed) twice, and we had a penalty both times. I think we had four 30-yard runs called back.
“Against a quality opponent, you can’t do that and overcome it. This week, we can’t overcome that. Those are things we have to clean up.”
Even with those struggles, LHS managed to rack up 508 yards in the victory.
Injury report
The Wolverines had a bit of scare last Friday night when star running back Miles Davis left the field for an injury and didn’t return.
Luckily, keeping Davis out was nothing more than a precautionary measure, and he will play this week against Stillwater.
“He didn’t come back in, but he could have,” Breeze said. “His helmet came down and cut him on the forehead. I guess when it happened, sweat got in there, and he was in a lot of pain. But we got him off, got it cleaned up and bandaged, and he was ready to go back in.”
Davis had done his part anyway, rushing for 292 yards and three touchdowns.
Breeze certainly doesn’t need to be told how important Davis is to the team, so trying to keep him and other starters healthy is a top priority.
Had Davis been out for an extended amount of time, LHS would’ve been severely limited on the ground. The team’s next leading rusher is wide receiver Demarcus Andrews, who has carried the ball only six times on receiver sweeps.
“We’re extremely thin at a lot of places,” Breeze said. “That’s a worry not just with him, but at a lot of positions. It’s a daily worry. Like (Tuesday), one of the reasons we came in was because it was getting slippery out there, and we didn’t want someone to slip and pull a groin.”
Practicing in wet conditions
Speaking of slippery, that is a condition the Wolverines were forced to deal with after a major rain storm rolled through Lawton on Tuesday.
The continuous rain made for a difficult practice session, and with no turf practice field, LHS was short on locations to work.
Normally in rainy situations, the team will load a bus and head to Cameron Stadium, but MacArthur was hosting a middle school game on Tuesday afternoon, so that wasn’t an option.
However, when the practice field is too wet or muddy, the LHS coaching staff leaves no stones unturned. If there is an area with dry enough grass, regardless of the location on campus, that is where the Wolverines operate for the day.
“We try to find a place to practice, whether it be going sideways on the field or on a chunk of grass by the softball field,” Breeze said. “We try to find anywhere we think we can get a safe practice in. It was a little damp the first half of practice, and we got a little drizzle the back half of defensive practice. Then it picked up and picked up, and pretty soon it got counterproductive, so we finished up defensive practice and went inside the gym.”
Stillwater without star RB
There’s no denying the Pioneers’ offensive prowess.
At 6-0, No. 1 Stillwater is averaging 46 points per game, defeating opponents by an average of 26.5 points. The Pioneers’ lowest-scoring game came in a 31-13 win over No. 5 Midwest City on Sept. 28.
The explosive trio of quarterback Gunnar Gundy, running back Qwontrel Walker and receiver Anthony Bland are most responsible for those numbers, but the group will be reduced to a duo against the Wolverines.
Walker, who has rushed for 1,060 yards and 17 touchdowns, was ejected from Stillwater’s game against Choctaw last week after receiving two unsportsmanlike conduct penalties.
The first was for excessive celebration, and the second was for cursing.
The Oklahoma Secondary Schools Athletic Association (OSSAA) rules state that if a player is ejected or disqualified for the remainder of the contest:
“A disqualified student shall remain ineligible for at least one additional contest before he/she is reinstated by the principal. A student whose flagrant or unsportsmanlike conduct consists of fighting, cursing or using foul language toward a game official will be automatically suspended from participating in a minimum of the next two games or contests that his/her team plays.”
Despite the timeliness of Walker’s disqualification, Breeze said he hopes the sophomore gets to play on Friday night.
“We don’t want them to make any excuses,” Breeze said. “We want to beat them at their best. It’s the exact same situation as a year ago. They came in here undefeated, and we’re almost identical to a year ago.”
Despite Walker being out, Breeze said he isn’t sure that gives his team the advantage because Stillwater has plenty of offensive weapons.
“He’s a good player, but they have other good ones,” Breeze said. “I don’t know what’s more dangerous — their run game or Gundy throwing it. It’s hard to say whether it’s an advantage or not. It probably means Gundy is going to throw it more, so it’s kind of a catch 22 to me.
“They have a handful of fullbacks, so they might try to go big on us. We don’t know what they’re going to do. Is their offensive game plan going to change? Will their favorite formations change schematically? We don’t know now.”
Walker rushed for 117 yards and a touchdown on 13 carries against LHS last season.
Something to prove
With Oklahoma State playing Kansas State on the road on Saturday, it’s fair to assume Mike Gundy, the father of previously mentioned Gunnar Gundy, won’t be in attendance at Cameron Stadium on Friday night.
However, that doesn’t mean the elder Gundy doesn’t have any interest in the contest outside of Gunnar’s performance.
After last season’s bout, Mike Gundy was reportedly interested in some of the Wolverines’ talent, and a big performance this year against the Pioneers could possibly garner even more interest for those who desire playing for OSU in the future.
“We told the kids this is what you want to play,” Breeze said. “This is a great high school game between two good teams — this is why you play the game. You have a chance to showcase yourself in front of (Mike) Gundy himself. Not many kids get that opportunity. If you truly want to go to Oklahoma State, you’ll stand out in this game.
“Not to mention they’re undefeated, they’re coming to our place and it’s homecoming, so there’s a lot of buildup for it.”