After thumping the No. 8 ranked team in the state 42-6 the week prior, the Mancos Blue Jays trailed the winless Sanford Indians 22-12 at halftime last Friday.
“I don’t know who showed up the first half, because that wasn’t Mancos football,” said Mancos co-head coach Josh Gardner. “We weren’t getting to the second level blocking, we were not attacking aggressively on defense and we did not have a very good game the first half.”
However, the Jays responded to the challenge by Gardner and co-head coach Adam Priestley and scored 28 unanswered points in the second half to come from behind and win 40-22.
Mancos is now 4-2 on the year and 3-0 in the A-8 Southwest League, and the Blue Jays will face one of their biggest challenges of the season on Friday in an away game against the No. 5 ranked Norwood Mavericks (4-1, 2-1 A-8 SW).
“I expect them to be physical as usual,” said Gardner. “But I do believe that we’re a physical team as well.”
The Mavericks ended Mancos’ season last year in the opening round of the 8-man playoffs. But Gardner said that the Blue Jays aren’t necessarily viewing the loss as motivation, and that they’re preparing for Friday as they do every game.
“We’re sticking to our game plan and what we usually do,” he said. “We’re not going to get outside of our comfort zone. We’re going to stick to our game plan that we usually have, we just need to be on our A game.”
