Home Opener, Second Win, Shutout for Power Football Wildcats

Edmonson County senior running back Carter Swihart (88) leaps over a Muhlenberg County defender to head into the end zone for a touchdown Friday September 6 in Brownsville.

Joseph Barkoff, story and photos:
​Is two a streak?
 
“Nah, we can go for one more,” Edmonson County High school junior quarterback Tristen Muse said after earning their second win of the season shutting out visiting Muhlenberg County, 13-0 Friday, September 6th in Brownsville.
 
A streak is technically a series or sequence of three of more but two is certainly on the way.
 
The only time Edmonson gave the ball to Muhlenberg was on kick offs and a couple of punts. Other than that, they held onto the ball for an enormous time of possession.
 
“The kids played hard and I am very proud of ‘em,” Edmonson County defensive coordinator Tommy Muse said after the game.
 
Holding onto the ball was one of the goals going into the game, Muse said. With Muhlenberg having the potential to run the option, midline veer, triples, and the quarterback is pretty good, they wanted to keep the ball offensively so “they wouldn’t be on the field as much.”
 
The team feels they have a good system of review and correct installed.
 
“It feels great,” Edmonson County head coach Justin Vessels said after the game. “It always feels good to win and I felt like we cleaned up some stuff from last week to this week. We played even better this week than we did last week. Hopefully that trend can continue, where we look at our mistakes from this game and get better for next week too.”

Edmonson County junior quarterback Tristen Muse (1) throws the ball downfield against visiting Muhlenberg County Friday September 6 in Brownsville.

Edmonson County junior running back Colton White (8) tries to shrug off a tack from visiting Muhlenberg County Friday September 6 in Brownsville.

​Minus a couple of miscues, the team has shown they can improve week to week. 
 
Plus, the time of possession really helped.
 
“That’s how we like to play football,” Vessels said. “We prefer to be a power running team with some misdirection and throw play-action off of our running game. We prefer to keep the time of possession in our favor.”
 
Going back to look at some of Muhlenberg’s scores from this season, they have scored plenty of points, so to shut them out, give coach Muse a lot of credit, Vessels said.
 
“I though the defense played outstanding tonight pitching a shutout,” Vessels said.
 
“He’s a tremendous defensive coordinator,” Vessels said of Muse.
 
Vessles’ favorite thing from the evening?
 
“We played hard for four quarters, I thought,” Vessels said. “In the first couple of games we kinda had slow starts. We came came out and played good from the start I thought, and that’s what we’ve gotta do. We’ve gotta start strong and play for four quarters.”

Edmonson County junior kicker Colton White (8) punts the ball against visiting Muhlenberg County Friday September 6 in Brownsville.

Edmonson County offense prepares to snap the ball against visiting Muhlenberg County Friday September 6 in Brownsville.

​The little mistakes are still on the radar to fix for the team, Vessels explained. 
 
An example of a mistake he wants to fix is lining up off sides. It made coach Muse very frustrated when they gave up free, easy yards through a penalty, he said.
 
Also, there was one “three and out, and we never want to go three and out on offense, so we want to fix that,” he said.
 
Overall, on the evening Vessels said he was “pleased with tonight.”
 
Tristen feels having the extreme time of possessions help the defense and he is glad the coaches trust him with the ball during the long segments of possession, he said.
 
“We are working really good right now,” Tristen said. “Best as we can.”
 
“I just need to air it out better,” Tristen said. “I think we played a pretty good game.”
 
“We fixed a lot of the small things. Now we just need to get the passing game going.”
 
Despite his confidence in himself and his squad, he feels they all could still improve, he said.
 
Edmonson County will have a chance to show they can continue to improve next week at home when Caverna High School travels from Horse Cave to Brownsville, Sept. 13th for a 7 p.m. kickoff.