The 3-4 Hollidaysburg Golden Tigers are defending their home field this week against the 2-5 Tyrone Golden Eagles.

“They’re a 5A school and they play some good competition, but at the same time, they’re struggling like we are. We’re just trying to get better every week,” said Tyrone Head Coach John Franco about the Eagles next opponent.

This week should be a very good game if the Eagles play the way that they did the second half of the Clearfield game. Both the Eagles and the Tigers are suffering from a large number of injuries.

“We need to go into the game and play the way that we played during the second half of the Clearfield game”, said senior running back Noah Zimmerman.

There are no regular season common opponents between these out of division teams to compare records, but both teams faced Mifflin County.  Hollidaysburg beat Mifflin County 27-0 earlier in the season, and Tyrone also had no problem with Mifflin County putting up 14 points by the half in a pre-season scrimmage.

According to Franco, there are three keys to this week’s game.

“Our number one is we have to win the turnover ratio. Number two, we have to control the controllable penalties, these are penalties we call off side type penalties. Our final thing is we have to limit or even eliminate the explosive plays,” said Franco.

The Tigers are a very tall team, but they are not a very hard-playing team. Their receivers are not very quick, and not as good as Tyrone’s receivers.

Hollidaysburg is a run-heavy team, but when they do pass the ball it usually is a bubble, or a slant.

On the year they have 63 completions for 710 passing yards. They also, have 254 carries for 1090 yards rushing.

They have a really tall running back that doesn’t like to be hit low and doesn’t run very hard. If Tyrone tries to tackle him high though he won’t have a problem running up the field. All they have to do is play hard and hit him low to shut down their run game.

They rely on their bubble screen to get them yards that they need when the run is not working. They also, like to throw a slant right behind the backers with a fake bubble. These are their two main passing plays that they use.

The Tigers have had a rough season so far. Each week has been a struggle for them just like the Eagles. One week they play a good game the next week they get badly by another team.The Tigers started their season off going 2-0, then they hit a losing streak until last week. After Hollidaysburg’s win last week they most likely will come out the gates excited and ready to win again.

This game should be a very good game for both teams, and should help boost the morale of the teams.

Tyrone needs to come out ready to punch them in the mouth and play hard nose football.

Prediction: Tyrone: 21       Hollidaysburg: 14