The Hampton-Dumont-CAL football team will host Clear Lake in Week 7 Friday, likely needing a win to stay within striking distance of a playoff appearance.
The Bulldogs (2-4, 0-2 3A-2) will look to bounce back from consecutive district losses, including an 18-16 loss at Webster City last week where early mistakes proved to be costly. Head Coach Cole Miller says a faster start is paramount.
“We still have a shot,” Miller says. “We’re going to have to beat some really good football teams, which I think we can. We played with Webster City, who fought tooth and nail with Clear Lake down to the wire. And I know that fourth quarter got away from them, but they kept it close. So I’m excited to see these guys accept that challenge. A couple of things we’ve got to change, obviously, is our slow start. We didn’t start quite as slow against Humboldt, but it still wasn’t as fast as we wanted to start. Definitely got to work on coming out of the gate swinging, and then we got to take care of the ball a lot better. So that’ll be a point of emphasis going forward.”
The Bulldogs were held to just 192 offensive yards last week.
Clear Lake (4-2, 1-1 3A-2) will look to bounce back after last week’s 28-7 loss at #1 (3A) Algona, where they fell behind early and didn’t recover. A potent rushing attack has produced 1,501 yards, led by Titan Schmitt’s 810 yards and eight touchdowns.
Clear Lake won last year’s meeting 21-6.
The kickoff will be at 7:00 p.m.
