In the last two weeks, Brownstown Central’s football team marched through the non-conference portion of its schedule impressively, defeating Seymour and Madison by a combined score of 69-14.

Now, two weeks before tournament play begins, the unbeaten Braves turn their attention to accomplishing an annual goal: winning the Mid-Southern Conference title.

To claim the 25th MSC title in program history, BC (7-0 overall, 5-0 MSC) will have to get past the conference’s biggest school, Class 4A Silver Creek (3-4 overall, 3-2 MSC). A win over the Dragons will clinch a share of the title; a win the following week against Scottsburg will give the Braves the outright league title.

“Obviously, we’d rather win the whole conference outright, but we’ll go one step at a time,” Brownstown head coach Reed May said. “Anytime you’re in a conference, whatever conference you may be in, you want to win the (title), especially since we’re one of the smallest schools in our conference.”

The Dragons started the season with a 3-1 record and appeared to be Brownstown’s main competition for conference supremacy. Since, however, the Dragons have lost three straight to Scottsburg, Jeffersonville and North Harrison to fall under the .500 mark.

An injury to starting quarterback Kedon Ward contributed to Silver Creek’s recent narrow losses. Junior Kam Black has taken over at QB for the Dragons.

“I think they’re searching for their identity right now,” May said. “They’ve lost four of their last five games and lost three in a row. They’ve been close losses, but any time you’re on a three-game losing streak, it affects you a little bit. When you’ve got a team that’s changed personnel and is struggling a little, you don’t know what their mindset will be when you go down and play them.”

Silver Creek’s defense is giving up just 20.7 points per game so far this season and would love to bounce back with a strong performance against Brownstown’s productive offense, which is averaging 47.9 points.

“They run, we call it, a 5-2 defense, an odd defense,” May said. “But then against Pekin and North Harrison, they went to a 5-3 similar to what Madison runs. So you kind of don’t know which one they’re going to run against us. We’re preparing for both. I’m not sure they’ll blitz as much as Madison did, but they did see what Madison did to us, and they may take some ideas from them.”

In last week’s 42-14 win, BC booted up its passing game to overcome an overloaded Madison defense designed to stop the Braves’ running game. Frequent blitzing helped the Cubs hold Brownstown to a season-low 213 yards on the ground, 123 yards below its season average.

The Braves still managed a comfortable win by letting quarterback Micah Sheffer throw the ball more than he has all season. The junior completed 11 of 15 passes to five different receivers for 165 yards, all season highs.

“We always thought passing was a real weapon for us, we just haven’t needed it,” May said. “I thought we may need to throw against Seymour but couldn’t because of the weather. We knew Madison was going to blitz the crap out of us and we were going to have to throw the ball. Micah is a great thrower and we’ve got some good receivers in our slots, tight ends and wide out. I’m happy how it panned out. Now teams watching our film know we can throw the ball, too.”

Despite earning arguably its best win of the season last week against Madison, BC saw its standing at the top of the various polls slip slightly due to an impressive 35-point win by Indianapolis Lutheran over Top 10 Monrovia.

The Braves dropped one spot to No. 2 in the updated Sagarin Ratings, just behind top-rated Indianapolis Lutheran. IL also leapt over BC in the latest coaches poll into the No. 2 spot. Brownstown is No. 3 while Lafayette Central Catholic maintained its No. 1 ranking.

Brownstown remains the No. 1 team in this week’s Associated Press poll and continues as the No. 2 team in the USA Today poll.

Silver Creek is unranked in the human-based polls and is rated No. 51 in the Class 4A Sagarin Ratings. In the overall Sagarin Ratings, regardless of class, Brownstown is rated 50th (down from 48th last week) while Silver Creek is slotted 226th.

Friday’s contest will be the 14th meeting between BC and SC. The Braves hold a 12-1 record against the Dragons, whose only win came in 2020.

Players of The Week

Offensive Back: Easton Branaman and Micah Sheffer

Offensive Line: Drew Shelton

Defensive Line/MLB: Cameron Markel

Defensive Back/Dime: Jaxson Johnson

Special Teams: Greg Hutcheson