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When schedules are released, you’re typically hoping your bye week falls somewhere towards the back half of the season.

For Morristown East it fell in week three this year, and after dropping their first two preseason games, it’s been a blessing heading into their matchup with William Blount.

“Right before your first region game, it gives you a good reset,” Morristown East head coach Dallas Kuykendall said. “You’ve got two games of film to go off of, make some defensive adjustments and all that good stuff, so it was good.”

For East, the focus has been on cleaning up the little things. In week two, against Hardin Valley, the 36-10 final score wasn’t reflective of their offensive production. They outgained the Hawks 352-274 in total yards of offense, but a myriad of special teams blunders negated many of the potential positives.

“You watch the tape and we probably gave (Hardin Valley) 28 points. Looking back at week one, we probably gave West 14 at least, maybe even 21, so that can’t happen,” Kuykendall said. “You can’t shoot yourselves in the foot. I was telling the kids, there were about 4-6 plays in week one and week two that we gave the other team that really blew the game open, and we can’t afford that. So this week has really been about figuring out what we can do in practice and what we can do in the weight room to where those plays don’t happen going forward.”

188 yards of their offense came on the ground, a big step up from the 63 yards their backs accounted for against West.

Eli Davis played a big role in that jump in production, taking his 10 carries for 91 yards and the only touchdown for the ‘Canes on the day.

“We knew early on in the spring that we have a variety of running backs that we can go to,” Kuykendall said. “Easton and Eli both bring different things to the table, so it was good to get that going. We challenged our offensive line, in week one they didn’t have a great showing, but in week two they were able to put us in a position to get things going and get the ball moving.”

If the first step was getting the ball moving and stringing drives together, the next is to cap them off with six.

“Against Hardin Valley we were able to move the ball up the field pretty well all night, we just couldn’t finish the drives,” Kuykendall said. “We moved the ball right down the field on that first drive, but once we get the ball down there we kick a field goal. When you’re giving up so many points on special teams, you can’t afford to end your drives in field goals.”

On the defensive side, the ‘Canes secondary will have their hands full. The Governors run a spread offense with a variety of receiver sets, including a lot of empty backfield looks.

Coming off a 29-28 thriller of a victory over county-rival Heritage, a game in which quarterback Brett Cortez threw for 179 yards and led the Governors in rushing, William Blount put a lot on tape for the ‘Canes to prepare for.

“Their quarterback is the real deal. He’s a good athlete, he can throw the ball, he can run it; he’s kind of the thing that makes them go offensively, so we’ll have our hands full,” Kuykendall said. “They’ve got two running backs that do a heck of a job, they’re physical up front, they’ve got some receivers that can catch it and make you miss and go. So we’ve got to be really sound in the front end; contain the run, contain the quarterback run, and on the backend, we’ve got to do a good job of making those throws hard.”

Cortez asks a difficult question of opposing defensive coordinators: blitz and open up passing lanes, or sit back in coverage and make yourselves susceptible to scrambles.

“I think you’ve got to pick your poison in some cases,” Kuykendall said. “If you pressure him, he’s going to be able to throw the ball down the field, if you sit back in a more base type defense you’re opening up some running lanes for him. We talked about it as a staff, and the box has got to handle the box. The front-seven has to do their job. The secondary can’t worry about the box, so it’s really a ‘do your job’ week for us.”

William Blount enters the matchup 3-0, to East’s 0-2, but Friday will reveal if scheduling is to blame. Being the first Region matchup for both sides, we should expect a lot of physicality.

Kickoff is set for 7:00 on Friday, at William Blount High School.

“I feel good, it’s our first region game so it’s a big one. We talked about it as a team on Monday, we’ve got to take care of business in our region. If you want to be playing in November, you’ve got to be able to win those region games, so this being the first is huge,” Kuykendall said. “The biggest thing for us is always to control what we can control. We can’t control who we’ve played or who they’ve played, at the end of the day it’s going to be East vs. William Blount and let’s roll the ball out there and let’s go.”