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HUDSON - With Terry Voyles becoming increasingly frustrated in what is shaping up to be yet another losing season for Hudson, his players gave their coach a respite.
In Friday's 50-8 blowout of Lecanto the Cobras exceled in every phase. The offense racked up 324 yards, the defense forced four turnovers (three interceptions and a fumble) and special teams came through with two punt returns for touchdowns.
"We decided we were going to run the score up on somebody," said Voyles, 13-32 in his fifth season at Hudson.
"No, I'm just kidding. Actually, we only scored three touchdowns on offense."
Tommy Snow, Travis Miller and Nathan Toole each had touchdown runs, but Miller's 361 all-purpose yards (155 on punt returns, 93 on an interception return, 77 rushing and 36 receiving) that impressed Voyles the most.
"He just had a tremendous night," Voyles said of Miller, who scored four touchdowns.
Up next for the Cobras is Gulf, a struggling team like Hudson that is trying to turn things around. Hudson enters Thursday's game at Cobra Stadium with a five-game winning streak against Gulf.
"All the games have been close and I expect this one to be too," Voyles said. "I know (Gulf coach Keith Newton is) over there hammering them how we've beaten them, but we've been lucky."
Hudson has won the past two meetings by 14 points each. Before that, Hudson won by two, seven and six points, which followed Gulf's 19-18 win in 1997.
SILVER LINING: Forget about Mitchell racking up better statistics than Zephyrhills in Friday's 21-18 loss. At least it did not happen in a district game.
The Mustangs' Class 4A, District 7 game at Land O'Lakes Friday has playoff implications. Mitchell and Land O'Lakes have matching 2-4 overall records and are 1-0 in the district.
"It's a big football game," Mitchell coach Scott Schmitz said. "The winner of this one really has a leg up on the district.
"And River Ridge has proven that they can play with anybody. It's still a three-team race. We've got to beat Land O'Lakes to keep it a three-team race. We want to win the thing this year. We don't want to go (into the playoffs) as runner-up."
Amassing 292 yards on offense while limiting Zephyrhills' offense to 144 is something to build on, Schmitz said.
"It's a tough (loss), but you've got to use it and use it in a positive way," Schmitz said. "We'll build from that."
HELP ON "D': Jeff Blanchette caught an interception in Gulf's 17-0 win over Tampa Catholic last week, the first time this season the quarterback has seen major playing time at safety.
In Thursday's 3A-9 clash with Hudson, Blanchette will be back in the secondary.
"He's got a nose for the football and he's probably one of the harder hitters on the team," Newton said. "He's a good player but he hasn't had a chance to play very much defense. But we need to use him and he's all excited about that."
That's because freshman wideout/safety Shawn Williamson is still out with a bruised hip and strained anterior-cruciate ligament in his right knee. Outside linebacker Bobby Harmer is also out with a strained quadriceps, forcing corner Victor Rodriguez to replace him. Safety Daniel Montanez moves to corner.
GAME-DAY DECISION: That's when River Ridge lineman Phil Combes will find out if he'll be back after tearing his meniscus, just hours before that night's 4A-7 game against Ridgewood.
"He doesn't know when the doctors are going to clear him," Royal Knights coach Mike DeGennaro said. "But he says it feels good."
The coach also praised his team's effort after last week's 31-17 win over Central, which ended a four-game losing streak that saw River Ridge lose by the slimmest of margins. Only two things need more work, he said: tackling and receiving.
"I don't think we made any mistakes," he said. "I think we can improve on our tackling, but otherwise we did well. We blocked well and we ran well.
"But we haven't been catching the ball really well. We've had a lot of drops lately, though (quarterback) Ryan (Mistal) has been getting the ball to where he needs to."