In the middle of one of the most special football seasons in Kentucky high school football history, on Oct. 5, 2017, the Logan County Cougars edged Hopkinsville 13-12. It was by far the closest game during a 10-0 perfect regular season, just a year after Logan had stumbled through the longest losing streak of that time frame over a five-season span.
That same year, on Nov. 10, 2017, visiting Hopkinsville ended the homestanding Cougars’ unbeaten streak at 12 games with a 43-8 playoff loss.
This year’s Cougars edged the Tigers by that same 13-12 score this year at—fittingly—the Stadium of Champions in Christian County.
Tonight, the Cougars will have their 7-0 record against Class 4A teams challenged by Hoptown again, also Cougar Field.
Coach Todd Adler and his team would love to make a clear statement that times have changed.
Hopkinsville is led by one of the deans of coaches in western Kentucky, Craig Clayton. After being tutored by one of the greatest coaches in this area’s history, his dad Fred Clayton, Craig became the starting center for some outstanding teams at Western Kentucky University, coached by Jimmy Feix, Robbie Franklin and Butch Gilbert. He became a high school coach with great success at a number of schools, including Franklin, Tenn.
Craig Clayton’s teams traditionally get better as the playoffs approach. His Tigers haven’t lost a game since playing the Cougars.
Todd Adler doesn’t have the same coaching lineage to Clayton’s. He was one of Logan’s best players ever while playing for Coach Lee Proctor, and he was around the Russellville football program of John Myers at Russellville while assisting his wife Dedra with the Lady Panthers basketball team.
But Adler is a great student of the game, and he is a tremendous motivator. His players do what he and his assembly of young coaches ask of them, and they do their best to carry out those plans.
In the last five seasons, Adler’s Cougars have gone 45-12 in the regular season and 4-4 in the playoffs. Last week’s rout of Madisonville-North Hopkins was his 50th as a head coach. A win tonight would be the program’s 50th in five seasons, a double figure average. They are 3-3 against Hopkinsville.
A key to winning tonight will be to show down Hoptown’s passing attack. The Tigers piled up 211 yards in a losing effort to Logan in the regular season. The Cougars held them to 52 rushing yards.
In that regular season win, Ryan Rayno rushed 16 times for 112 yards. Wyatt Blake managed only 9 yards in 7 tries, but one of them went for a touchdown. He also scored on one of Davin Yates’ 12 completions in 14 tries. Yates threw for 89 yards. Mattia Giubilato kicked his only point-after attempt successfully. The Cougars went for two points on the other touchdown, but it didn’t work out.
As has been the case often, Elijah Hawkins was the leading tackler with 9, including 7 solos, 2 sacks, and 2 more tackles of losses. Jesse Buchanan and Cade Johnson each had 6 tackles Yates had 5 solo tackles and joined Johnson and John Ross Terry with a tackle for a loss each. Zane Batten had 5 tackles and Peyton Taylor recorded a sack.
Tonight’s game will be carried live over all of WRUS’ platforms with Andy and Zak Woodall wearing the headsets.
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