SPORTS

H.S. FOOTBALL: Milan, Liberty set for first meeting

Brandon Shields
bjshields@jacksonsun.com

MILAN – Friday night’s high school football game between Milan and Liberty will be historic for a few reasons.

The main one: It’s a matchup of two of the best programs in rural West Tennessee over the last few years who’ve never met.

Milan has a claim as the best program – most would probably agree – having been to the playoffs 31 of the last 32 years and making it to the state semifinals six of the last seven years.

“Liberty’s got to be one of the best programs around here,” Milan head coach Jeff Morris said. “Their record over the last few years might not look like they are, but you look at the competition they’ve faced and you might change your mind.”

Both teams appear to be among the best in the area again this year.

The Crusaders leapfrogged Milan and a few other teams to be named the No. 4 team in the state in Class 3A in the weekly Associated Press high school football top 10. Milan is ranked seventh. Liberty is the No. 2 team in the Sun’s Dirty Dozen rankings, while Milan is fifth.

The strength of Liberty appears to be the defense, and Morris said that’s not really a secret to anyone who follows football around here.

“Start by looking at what they’ve actually accomplished – three points by Henry County and shutting North Side out,” Morris said. “Those are two good teams, so I already knew before I turned on the film they were going to be a good looking team. The results speak for themselves.”

Then Morris turned on the game film, and his suspicions were confirmed.

“They’re fast, strong kids that play hard,” Morris said. “Their secondary is athletic enough they can play you man-to-man in pass coverage and not lose anything.

“Their linebackers are a bunch of strong kids that can stuff the run game too.”

The line up front won’t be the largest Milan faces this year.

“We may have a little bit of an advantage there, but their speed will be something we’ll have to deal with,” Morris said. “We can’t let those guys break through and get to our backfield.”

The backfield is already suffering from injury as J.P. Porter suffered a broken bone in his ankle in Week 1 at Peabody. Morris expects Porter to be back in about six weeks. Lineman Jack Fisher also suffered a torn ACL in that game. He’ll have surgery to repair it Friday and begin the rehabilitation process to be back for his senior season next year.

“Our philosophy is the next man up when we have injuries, and the guys we put out there in their places against Humboldt did well last week,” Morris said. “We’ll hopefully keep that up this week.”

Brandon Shields, 425-9751