The Lake Oconee Academy football team travels to Loganville this Friday to take on Loganville Christian Academy (LCA) at 7:30 p.m.
• Series Record: Lake Oconee Academy leads the all-time series, 1-0.
• Last Meeting: Lake Oconee Academy defeated Loganville Christian Academy 15-14 in 2022. Titans’ head coach Patrick Stewart returns to his old stomping grounds this Friday for the team’s sixth game of the season.
Stewart, who used to coach for the Lions, emphasized in an interview with the Lake Oconee News that he wants to simplify the offensive playbook and play to their standard.
“LCA looks to have some good skill players so we have to contain them, and offensively we’re going to keep things very simple,” Stewart said. “I believe we are better upfront than them, so it will be a huge test for our offensive line and defensive line to dominate and play to our standard.”
These two teams played each other for the first time last year and it ended with the Titans coming out on top after a late two-point conversion.
In that contest, Lake Oconee Academy’s offense put up close to 250 yards of total offense, with 200 of those coming on the ground. After not finding the end zone last week, Stewart will likely follow a similar game plan to last year’s contest and get the run going early.
This year’s Lions team also plays right into the Titans’ strength – its defense. LOA is only giving up 16 points per game which is ironically how much LCA’s offense scores per game, on average.
Recently, the Titans have been managing to get opposing teams to turn the ball over, and it would certainly be important to win the turnover battle this Friday. Last week, LOA seemed to find some success through its special teams units and forced a couple of takeaways on defense.
As he looks ahead, Stewart stresses that the most important thing his players can do right now is focus on what’s in front of them and perfect the game plan that will be in place.
“At this point of the season, we can’t let time beat us. We have played a lot of football and practiced so much since April,” Stewart said. “We can’t let our practices or days go by without getting better at something. The kids have to understand there is always room for improvement. Even in Week 10, we want to still be getting better at one thing daily.”
With a win, Lake Oconee Academy would move back to .500 on the season and have some momentum heading into next week’s away contest at Crawford County.