Cyclones’ comeback starts tonight

The Eastern View High School football team has already faced the three-team gauntlet that’s fighting for the Battlefield District title — Chancellor, James Monroe and Courtland. Now the Cyclones are looking at tonight’s game at Caroline as a prime opportunity to bounce back.

Eastern View (3-4, 1-3) dropped all three games to the so-called “Big 3,” but the Cyclones believe they can take enough from those losses to finish out the remainder of the season on a winning streak.
If that’s to take place it would begin tonight against the Cavaliers, who are 0-7 and have only scored 20 points all season.

“We haven’t been down at all,” Eastern View coach Greg Hatfield said. “We played three really good teams in four weeks and in each one of those games we had opportunities to do something. We had an opportunity to go up 14-7 last week (against James Monroe) and had that touchdown called back. We’ve got to take advantage of those opportunities.”

Hatfield said the mood around the Cyclones’ locker room has stayed upbeat despite losing three of the past four games. But Eastern View has been working on picking up the pace in practice and the Cyclones hope a more up-tempo game plan will put pressure on the Cavaliers.

“We’ve been practicing real hard and working on changing the tone,” EVHS senior defensive lineman Patrick Wilson said. “We’ve been picking the tempo up everyday in practice. We’ve had some bad games, but we’re eager to get better. We’re hungry. We’re ready to win out this season.”

It could be a prime opportunity for Eastern View’s offense to get back on track. The Cyclones averaged 35 points per game in their three victories, but were shutout in losses to Courtland and Chancellor and only scored six points against JM.

“I don’t think the scores have been indicative of the games,” Hatfield said. “When (JM coach Rich) Serbay talked he was really complimentary of our boys and where they are and how they fought.”

Hatfield is returning to the Eastern View sideline after missing last week’s game while his young son was in the hospital, the latest in a string of off-the-field issues that have plagued the Cyclones throughout the season.

“That’s a testament to our kids and our coaching staff, our assistant coaches, that they’ve handled all that,” Hatfield said. “Our kids could have folded tent and it could have gotten ugly, but they battled hard the whole game. I’m proud of that kind of stuff.”

Caroline has also faced challenges away from the field, including the arrest of first-year coach Ben Boyd this summer. Boyd is awaiting trial on forgery charges. Hatfield said the Cavaliers are an athletic team that is capable of playing better than they have this year.

“They are not that far removed from being a playoff team two years ago,” Hatfield said. “They’ve struggled with some stuff, but if you look at them on tape you see that’s an athletic football team that can run vertical and go deep. We’re going to try to stop that from happening.”