“The defenses will be the key to the game,” Titans coach Gary Rose said. “Our defense has been playing pretty well, and Guthrie's is the best we've seen.”
Both teams are loaded at all positions on the defensive side of the ball, and both defenses are fast.
“I think their linebackers are about as good as I've seen,” Rose said. “And we're in the same boat. Our linebackers are really solid. Our ends are really solid. Our secondaries are both athletic.
“(Guthrie senior Landry Chappell) is the best linebacker I've seen in a good while.”
Heading into last week's 60-0 win over Noble, Chappell had 60 tackles for the season.
As with most evenly matched rivalries, this one could come down to mistakes.
“We think it's gonna be an extremely tight ballgame, and if it's not, then that means one team had a lot of turnovers and penalties,” Watkins said. “We think it's gonna be a four-quarter ballgame.”
