While most other football teams have started district play or are getting ready to begin league action, Comfort High still has two more non-district games on the schedule before starting 13-3A DII play.
Comfort visits Llano Friday and then is home next Friday to close out non-district against Bandera for homecoming.
CHS is at Llano this Friday, 7 p.m.
After dropping their opener against Dilley, Comfort has won two straight over Ingram (34-29) and last week vs. Johnson City (21-14).
The Bobcats had their opener on Aug. 30 cancelled because of weather and head coach Jay Rieken said the team is finally getting up to speed.
They’ll have five games under their belt by the time district rolls around on Oct. 18 and the coach hopes not playing that one game in August won’t matter by then.
“We’re starting to catch up, we’ve got a bunch of juniors and sophomores and we’re getting a little more experience each week,” he said. “We hope we continue to get better heading into district.”
Comfort is familiar with Llano and has been in the same district with them over the years. The Yellowjackets are off to a solid start at 3-1.
“They do everything well. They have a lot more seniors than we do and they’re playing really well,” Rieken said. “They’re going to give us all we can handle. It’ll be a great atmosphere, it’ll be fun.” Comfort’s two-game win streak has been predicated on running the ball. Against Ingram, Topper Sterling ran for 317 yards, while the team rolled to 474 rushing yards.
Last week at Johnson City, Comfort tallied 314 rushing yards, while Sterling recorded 112 yards, QB Carter Pape ran 83 yards on 11 carries and Jared Valadez added 60 yards on 9 totes.
The Bobcats were 0 for 2 passing against Ingram and went 2 for 3 for 46 yards with one interception, so moving the ball through the air hasn’t really factored into their game plan.
“We work on our passing game, but we like to run the ball,” Rieken said. “When we run, we keep the other team’s offense off the field.”
Comfort’s defense has played well lately. They limited Ingram to 29 points and held Johnson City to 14 points. The Eagles were kept off the board in the first half of last Friday’s game.
One thing that Rieken said he would like to see his team do is learn to close out games stronger.
Yes, they’ve won the last two but the coach said they’ve had chances to put away teams earlier in the contest but haven’t been able to and the games have gone to the very end when they should have been over sooner.
“We’ve got to learn to finish,” he said. “The last couple of weeks we’ve needed a first down to end it and couldn’t get it when we needed it. We still won but we have to learn to play a complete game.”
Another thing Rieken would like to see them do is take better care of the ball. They’ve had four fumbles in their last two games and lost three of them.
“We have to quit fumbling,” he said, “and I’d like to see us cut back on penalties.”
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