Robinson, Beebe both looking for improvement Friday night

By Jeff Halpern 

Joe T. Robinson and Beebe are in different spots in the 5A-Central standings, but head coach Todd Eskola and Chris Gunter are looking for a lot cleaner efforts from their teams Friday night at Charlie George Stadium in Little Rock.

The 12th-ranked Senators (5-1, 4-0) trail the Mills Comets (7-0, 5-0) with that matchup coming up on Oct. 21. Their only loss was in the season opener to No. 4 Pulaski Academy, 55-29. They are coming off a 35-30 victory over Maumelle coached by their former assistant coach Brian Maupin. What Robinson coach Todd Eskola did not like in that game was his team committed four turnovers and seemed to be focused a lot more on trying to impress their former assistant instead of treating it like another game.

“We’ve got to play a lot better than we did last week,” said Eskola. “Part of that was we were facing a former coach. Maumelle also had an extra week to prepare and that showed.”

With this being the Senators’ homecoming game, Eskola hopes his team can maintain focus and not get caught up in distractions at school.

Beebe (4-3, 2-3) is tied for sixth and is coming off consecutive losses, 49-14 at Pine Bluff and 17-14 to Vilonia. Head coach Chris Gunter was diasppointed with the number of mental mistakes and blown assignments he saw in the upset loss to Vilonia.

“The big things we need to put the focus on what we need to do,” said Gunter. “We had a lot of mental mistakes and blown assignments. In the first half, I counted on 12 of the 19 plays we had in the first half a number of missed assignments and mental errors. The effort was not an issue. I can take losing to a better team, but I can’t take seeing us commit so many mistakes.”

Gunter’s task is to defend a team that features sophomore quarterback Quentin Murphy, a major Division I college prospect, who has thrown for 789 yards with 11 touchdowns with 4 interceptions. He’s also rushed for 190 yards while averaging 4.0 yards per carry. Senior running back Noah Freeman has rushed for 945 yards while averaging 12.1 yards per carry and has scored 18 touchdowns. Eskola has called him “the best back in the state” and wonders why he hasn’t been recruited any harder. Senior Brandon Greil has caught 14 passes for 330 yards and 4 touchdowns and senior Chase Nichols has caught 13 passes for 136 yards and 4 touchdowns.

On defense, linebacker Ashtyn Williams has 85 tackles including 12.5 for losses. Freshman Isiah Reese has 44 tackles. Defensive tackle Micah Pennington has appeared in three games has has 20 games with 3.5 for losses. Senior Julian Campos leads the Senators in sacks with 3.5. Senior Gabriel Bonner leads the team interceptions with 4.

“The thing that impresses me is the athletes they have,” said Gunter. “They are so well coached and so tough to defend.”

Despite Beebe’s recent struggles, Eskola is impressed by what’s he’s seen by the Badgers. “Beebe’s a young team, and they play hard,” said Eskola. “They fly to the ball and have some good athletes. I know they beat White Hall earlier in the season and the Pine Bluff game got away from them. They have a good running back and a huge nose tackle.”

Quarterback Zach Grant (17-of-39 passes for 289 yards, 199 yards rushing and 3 touchdowns while averaging 8.0 yards per carry) has returned after getting hurt against White Hall. Kindrea Barker (264 yards rushing, 3 touchdowns and averaging 11.0 yards per carry) starts at running back and their top wide receivers are Jayden Smith (8 reception for 58 yards) and Kaleb O’Neil (4 receptions for 154 yards and 3 touchdowns) The top players are on defense are nose tackle Garrison Waldrop, linebacker Jaxcen Marsh and defensive backs Dayton Marsh and Braydon Sanders.

Gunter said the keys are going to be giving maximum effort on every play and making sure everyone is executing their assignments. On offense he said his team needs to stay ahead of the chains and stay out of long-yardage situations. On defense he said they need to contain Murphy and Freeman and show “pass rush integrity” and not get out of their lanes.

Eskola said his team cannot turn the ball over. “If we turn the ball over, it will be a dogfight and last week we turned the ball over and it was a dogfight. If we protect the ball, somebody is going to have to play very well to beat us,” he said.

After moving up from Class 4A, Eskola didn’t dread the move to 5A, emphasizing that the long trips to Nashville and Ashdown were going to be a thing of the past. While his team has dealt with some injuries, he believes his team is doing what he wants them to do and that’s get better every week. The big difference he sees in both classes is while the talent level at the top of 5A and 4A are similar, he said the teams in the middle and bottom of 5A are stronger.

Gunter would like to see his team get to .500 in conference play with two games left so they can have a shot of making the playoffs. “That is something we’ve talked about all week,” he said. “We need to take it one game at a time.”