Posted: Nov 14, 2013
Moge's Musings - November 14, 2013
The 2013 football boils down to one last game—this Saturday afternoon at Goering Field in North Newton.
The Swedes will tangle with Bethel in an effort to avoid sharing ninth place with the Threshers and sinking to the 10th seed in next fall's HOA-KCAC Challenge.
This year's Threshers broke a two year victory drought with a season opening win over Haskell but have dropped nine straight since that time.
Along the way, only three more times has Bethel come close to victory. Kansas Wesleyan scored in the final minute of play to pull out a 38-34 win, Central Methodist squeaked by the Threshers 38-31 in this year's challenge game and St. Mary prevailed 45-37.
Other than that, teams have hung 86, 76, 69, 54, 51 and 47 points on them.
On the other side of the coin, Bethel scores 28.2 points per game, nearly nine more than Bethany and averages 374.8 yards per game.
Obliviously, scoring and moving the football isn't the problem. It's stopping people.
Coming in to the final week, Bethel is last in scoring defense surrendering 52.4 points per game and 553.5 yards per outing. The Bethel run defense gives up 320.7 yards per game and 232.8 per game through the air.
But, as Manny Matsakis warned his team, what is in the past is in the past. This week it all starts over for 60 minutes and if the Swedes head down I-135 to North Newton expecting a pushover, this could be a nightmare in broad daylight.
The Swede defense will have to contend with Stephen Scott, the number five rusher in the KCAC with 1293 yard through ten games. They also must be aware of Brandon Scott, ranked 5th in passing with a 163 yard average.
What should be positives for Bethany is the fact they rank third in total defense, fourth in rushing defense and second in pass defense.
When looking at Bethel's personnel, they have decent size on the offensive line to make room for the 190 pound Scott and to protect the quarterback.
Defensively, the Threshers are a different story. Their 4-man front goes 245, 230, 240 and 210. Of the seven men behind the line, only one player listed at larger than 200 pounds.
What this adds up to is that the Swedes will need to pound the ground. Get good, solid push from the interior line to give Tevis Linnebur creases to hit. If they do that, Linnebur should have a good game and Bethany should reach the endzone more than they have since the season opener (34 points).
It would be nice to give the seniors a nice win to close their careers on and a good springboard to the recruiting season that has been on the coaching staff all season long.
TIDBIT
But, the cold winds of winter have hit us hard this week and now it's time to move indoors and think of basketball. Both men's teams will continue non-conference play until December when the conference portion of the schedule rolls around.
This weekend should be interesting for the women as they must be in two places at once. The varsity will be in Lamoni, Iowa for a return game with Graceland while the junior varsity of seven players, will head to Dodge City for a classic against a pair of Jayhawk Conference Juco teams.