By Malcolm Butler
Following a team meeting Sunday at the school, Cedar Creek head coach Matt Middleton kept his seniors a few minutes longer than the rest of the squad to convey what he felt was an important message.
Just a few hours earlier the Cougars found out they would be hosting Slaughter Community Charter Friday in the first round of the Select Division IV playoffs. Kickoff will be 7 p.m. from Cougar Stadium.
So what was Middleton’s message to his seniors?
“Don’t get all sentimental and act like its your last game, but enjoy it from here on out because there are no more guarantees after this one,” said Middleton. “I don’t want to treat it like its a farewell deal, but they do need to realize that they only have three guaranteed full practices left, plus a walk through and a game.
“You can run 5Ks until you are 80. You can play tennis You can play golf. You can play church men’s basketball. Slow pitch softball. You can go shoot a bow and arrow. But the most finished sport you can ever be involved with is football. And for a lot of these seniors there is no more of that after high school. You go from such a hard structured base to being done.”
One of those seniors was Middleton’s son, Caden.
“I’ve got (Caden),” said Middleton. “We sat on the couch and talked for about 30 minutes last night, and it kind of hit me too.”
Creek is the No. 16 seed and sits at 6-4 on the season. The Cougars just did sneak into the group of eight teams that get a chance to host in the first round. Slaughter Community Charter is the No. 17 seed. Based out of the Baton Rouge area, SCC is 7-3 and finished third in District 9-1A behind Kentwood and Southern Lab.
Middleton said the two teams exchanged tape and that Creek has SCC’s games against Kentwood, Southern Lab and Jewel Sumner. He knows what a huge plus it is to be playing at home Friday.
“Awesome. We play really well at home,” said Middleton. “I would much rather it be them that is driving four hours than us. I am extremely excited about that and the kids are excited about it. It gets us back in our routine. We are 6-0 at home.”
The winner of the contest will travel to face No. 1 seed Vermilion Catholic in a second round match-up the following Friday night, but first things first. Creek must win to keep its season alive.
“We still have a lot of football left to play for and I still think we can make a splash,” said Middleton. “We will have to play well. We will need to bounce back to go do what we want to do.”
Tickets for the contest will be $12.
