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RUTLEDGE – Grainger head football coach Michael Manis knows his team will face a big challenge this week, both literally and figuratively.

Elizabethton long ago established itself as an elite high school program and one of the key components in that success has been the Cyclones’ sheer size. The Grizzly boss said the 2023 edition of the team has outdone themselves. “Big is an understatement,” Manis said. “From a physicality and size perspective, this is the best Elizabethton team we have faced since I’ve been here. They are huge up front on the offensive and defensive lines and also have good size in the backfield. We will have to manage the a game as best we can, especially against their running attack. Offensively, we will try to manage the game by controlling clock and try to keep the ball away from them. So far, we have done a good job of running the football but this week will be a harder task because of the team we are playing. We will have to look to take advantage of some alignments we have against them.”

Elizabethton is 2-0 after hammering Science Hill in the season opener and then getting past Morristown West 20-7 last week in a game that was called early due to inclement weather. The Trojans kept things close in the first half as they only trailed the Cyclones 7-0 but they were haunted by 135 yards of penalties. Elizabethton sophomore quarterback Rhett Slagle was 11-of-22 for 173 yards and a touchdown but the West defense picked him off twice. Slagle’s favorite receiver was senior Luke Whaley who caught five passes for 105 yards.

The Trojans may have given Grainger some major pointers on how to contain the Cyclones. “Watching the game on film, that was one of the best Morristown West teams I’ve seen in a while,” Manis said. “They looked like one of those old West defenses from when I was growing up and they did a good job of being physical with Elizabethton up front. We were able to take some of the things they did successfully last week. Penalties were an issue for West last week but Elizabethton has had some problems with that early too so we have been really talking to our guys this week of how important it is to play as cleanly as we can. We might be able to get them into some long down and distance situations based off penalties so we are going to try to make the game as short as possible and hold on to the ball better than we did last week.”

Grainger switched defenses for this season and through two games, the new scheme has worked out well. The Grizzlies have given up an average of 177 yards to opposing offenses and 19 points per game. In last week’s contest against Chuckey-Doak, the Black Knights had only 161 yards of offense and were an anemic 1-of-6 on third downs. Manis said he has been pleased with the defensive effort of his team so far.

“There is still some tweaking we are doing from week to week to see if we can do better but overall, we really like what we are doing on the inside and up front. While Chuckey-Doak was big, we haven’t faced a team as physical as we will see Friday night so we will be able to see where we are this week. This week’s game will be a judgement of where we are at and how physical we will be as a football team.”

On offense, the Grizzlies have used a balanced attack in their ground game as Hunter Mallicoat has rushed for 174 yards and Dawson Fowler is close behind at 166. Grainger has outgained their opponents 614-354 so far this season.

Since joining the district, the Cyclones have won all six meetings against Grainger which includes a 47-0 shutout in 2022.

Grainger and Elizabethton kick things off at The Den at 7:30 p.m. on Friday.