Herald Staff Report
CLINTON —
After facing quarterbacks who gave them fits the past two weeks, the Clinton River Kings will turn their attention to stopping one of the top running backs in the Mississippi Athletic Conference tonight.
Zach Minch, who trails only quarterbacks Randy Schmidt of North Scott and Will Carr of Clinton on the list of the MAC’s leading rushers, will be the focal point of Clinton’s defense tonight when the River Kings (1-1) and Blue Devils (0-2) meet at Brady Street Stadium.
“They have a pretty potent running attack with him,” Clinton coach Lee Camp said of Minch, who has gained 378 yards on 51 carries. “He’s one of the fastest guys on the field. They try to take advantage of that and get him to the outside.”
To counter that, the River Kings will tweak their defense a bit.
“We’ll change things a little and put another guy in the box,” Camp said. “We have to come in with the idea that we must stop the run.”
Clinton did a good job stopping the run in a Week 1 win against Davenport North and Robert Pemberton, but last week Schmidt ran for 295 yards and led North Scott to a 48-38 comeback win in Clinton. Camp said the defense is better than the numbers might indicate.
“On three of their long runs we made mistakes,” he said. “I think the defense can really come together.”
The River Kings opened up their offense in the loss, and Carr ran for 258 yards and passed for 160 in the loss. He’ll look for another big game tonight.
“They’re fairly quick,” Camp said of Central’s defense. “They run a 4-3 and get a lot of people to the ball. They run Cover 2 and Cover 4, and they’re going to blitz a lot. They’re going to put pressure on Will to read quick, but make the right read and it can be costly to them.”
