Linden prepared for physical Southern Choctaw team

LINDEN — The Patriots will wrap up their regular season at home Thursday night in what could be their most physical game to date in 2012 as they take on Southern Choctaw.

“They’re fast, physical. They try to run right at you, around you, across you and between you,” Linden head coach Andro Williams said of the Indians. “They can beat people. They are going to be fast and physical defensively. You have to appreciate the kind of ball they play. We’ll have our hands full.”

Southern Choctaw enters the contest on a five-game winning streak, its last loss coming at the hands of Sweet Water in the form of a 14-8 setback Sept. 21.

The Sweet Water loss marked the third straight defeat for the Indians and sent the Silas squad to 1-3 on the year. Since then, SCHS has rolled up Class 5A Citronelle and a quartet of region teams on its way to grabbing the No. 4 seed in Class 2A, Region 1.

“They are sitting there with three losses in that region and they could easily have beaten any of those three football teams,” Williams said of the Indians. “They have got kids that play hard and get to that football in a hurry. Offensively, they can go the distance at any point in the game on any particular play.”

The contest will stand as the final tune-up for Linden as it prepares to host Kinston in round of the Class 1A state playoffs.

“I think they are huge,” Williams said of the impact the final regular season game on his team’s playoff preparations. “I haven’t been a part of a week 10 that we lost. But we see it as a playoff atmosphere and as a playoff type game. We’re still trying to get better at learning how to play. We’ve got several things that we can definitely preach to try to get better at as a team. We’re by far not where we’d like to be. We’ve still got a long way to go.”

The Patriots and the Indians are scheduled to kick off Thursday night at 7 p.m. in Linden.