Week 6 lookahead

We're on the home stretch of the 2009 football season -- the HHC race really heats up this week. Every team will have played at least half its conference schedule by the time the gun sounds on Friday night, and the conference race really begins to heat up this week.

Two of the three unbeatens in conference play -- Shelbyville and Mt. Vernon -- match up on Friday night. Two other teams in the upper part of the conference standings -- Yorktown and New Palestine -- also match up.

The matchups should be good and the games interesting this Friday. Obviously, things will really shake out with who plays whom.

There are really a couple of Games of the Week this week. The Shelby-MV game is obviously going to break part of the three-way tie atop the league standings. Our goal at CCSN is not just to bring you some of the best live sports coverage, but also to bring you as much access to football as possible. To that end, we're going to allow our friends at WSVX-1520 in Shelbyville to bring you the Shelby-MV game, and we'll have the other "Game of the Week" -- New Palestine at Yorktown -- on Friday night.

Of course, you can listen to the NP-Yorktown game here, with myself & Jim Ryan on the call. Read on for a preview of that game and all of the HHC games.

CCSN/TGD Game of the Week broadcast
New Palestine (3-2/2-1) at Yorktown (3-2/2-2)
Broadcast: 7 p.m., Friday, Sept. 25 (Andrew Smith/Jim Ryan)
Listen LIVE here

The coaches
NP: Tim Able (1st year at NP, 3-2; 18th year overall, 98-94).
Yorktown: Mike Wilhelm (5th year, 27-21)

Scouting the Dragons: New Palestine has alternated wins and losses so far, but the Dragons' two losses are to a pair of unbeatens -- 4A No. 7 Delta and a Batesville team that's lurking just outside the 3A Top 10. NP's offense has shown signs of explosiveness, and a big reason for that is wingback/running back Pat Feeney, who is averaging close to 180 yards from scrimmage this season and has nine touchdowns on offense. He also has four interceptions on defense. He suffered a hamstring injury in last week's win over Rushville, but has been practicing this week. He had 146 yards on the ground, 55 through the air and a combined three TDs in that contest, a 34-13 victory for the Dragons. His big night was a 300+ yard performance against Pendleton Heights, which also included an interception. NP has shown quite a few other weapons this season, with Michael Phelps and Brett Jackson combining for 74 yards on 12 carries last week. QB Cary Albrecht is a run-pass threat -- he was 3-for-9 for 62 yards last week -- but Jackson, a QB who plays running back, also tossed a 55-yard TD pass on a halfback pass. The week before, Albrecht was 15-of-22 passing against a solid Batesville defense. The Dragons lost 37-0 to the Tigers last year, but had won eight straight in the series prior to then. A win for the Dragons would be the 99th in head coach Tim Able's decorated career.
Scouting the Tigers: The Tigers found out Delta is as good as advertised last week in a 56-13 defeat at the hands of the Eagles. Yorktown's two conference losses have come at the hands of two-thirds of the league leaders -- Delta & Mt. Vernon. NP's only conference loss has come to Delta. Yorktown is led by its defense, which had produced four takeaways and a touchdown in its last victory -- a 28-14 win over Greenfield-Central two weeks ago. Joe Journay has led the way with 42 tackles, including 7 sacks. He had a school-record five in a shutout win over Muncie South in Week 3. On offense, Yorktown features a powerful running game out of multiple formations, much like NP. The main difference is, while NP will spread the ball around to several backs, the Tigers will feature bruising junior Derek Kundenreich. He ran for 118 yards last week -- his fourth 100-yard game of the season -- and he ranks among the HHC leaders in rushing yardage with an average of 106 yards per game. His 530 yards account for 62% of the Tigers' rushing total. Speedy wingback Brendon Barnes is a dangerous threat. He's Yorktown's leading receiver (141 yards) and second-leading rusher. The Tigers are quarterbacked by Kyle Weiss, who has completed 41% of his passes for 267 yards.

Other HHC games
Mt. Vernon (4-1/3-0) at Shelbyville (5-0/3-0): Wow. What a matchup. Both of these teams have been lighting up the scoreboard with their Wing-T offenses -- averaging 37-38 ppg in conference play. The Marauders have posted some impressive victories -- a 32-0 win over Yorktown in Week 2 and last week's 38-14 win over Pendleton Heights in which the Marauders scored all of their points in the middle two quarters and didn't allow the Arabians a first down until late in the third quarter. Shelby's defense was impressive last week, too, in a 19-0 shutout of Greenfield-Central. The Marauders' attack is led by FB Trey Ross, who scored three first-half TDs last week and totaled 84 yards rushing. He has 10 TDs on the year and averages a shade under 500 yards per game. The Golden Bears also have a multi-headed monster. Halfback Patrick Ellis totaled 99 yards and two TDs last week, while QB Kevin Prosch ran for 96 and threw for 62. Shelby outgained G-C 329-70 last week. The winner gets at least a piece of the HHC lead, with both teams still having games looming with Delta. MV faces the Eagles in Week 8, Shelby in Week 9.
Rushville (1-4/0-3) at Greenfield-Central (1-4/0-4): The Cougars play their final conference game before heading into play against their county rivals. The one thing that impressed me about the Cougars two weeks ago when we saw them was their hitting on defense. Led by Eric Roberts and a lot of fleet players up front, G-C has a defense that hits hard and flies to the football. That showed two weeks ago when they forced four turnovers against Yorktown, and again last week, when they became the first team to hold Shelbyville to under 35 points this season. G-C also has a couple of offensive weapons in sophomore playmaker Matt Dickerson, senior wideout Kevin Bordenkircher and senior slot John White. All three made big plays against Yorktown -- the latter two with TD catches -- while White had two catches for 22 yards last week. Rushville counters with a very good veer-option running offense that can be very difficult to defend. Against NP last week, Joe Hunter ran for 77 yards and QB Spencer Comer ran for 48 and threw for 53, completing 8-of-16 passes. G-C's strength is its defense. Rushville's is its offense. It'll be interesting to see what happens when they're matched up.
Delta (5-0/3-0) at Pendleton Heights (1-4/1-4): The Eagles have been on fire so far, winning by an average of 42-6. They're the HHC's top offensive AND defensive team. They held up that end with a 56-13 win over Yorktown last week. Running back Teddy Dawson ran for 248 yards last week and is among the HHC's top rushers. He had a 90-yard run for a TD against the Tigers. Delta's Logan Young had a 76-yard touchdown catch, and QB Ozzie Mann threw for two TDs despite attempting only five passes. Needless to say, the Eagles are a pretty well-oiled machine, both on the ground and through the air. PH has struggled a bit to get started the last few weeks. The Arabians fell behind 38-0 and didn't get a first down until late in the third quarter last week against MV. When they did get going, QB Grant Hendershot came on in relief and threw two TD passes to Dezmon Nunn in the fourth quarter. Two weeks ago against Shelbyville, Mitch Patishall came off the bench and led the Arabians to 22 second-half points. The Arabians have some weapons on offense -- Patishall and Hendershot are both solid QBs, and Hendershot also has a 125-yard receiving game. RB Ravaughn White has a ton of speed -- he has a long KOR for a TD this year, and also had a 71-yard touchdown catch against New Palestine.

Other area games
Eastern Hancock (0-5) at North Decatur (1-4): Our base is Hancock County, and we always try to keep an eye on what the Royals are doing. They're 0-5, but had their best game last week in a 33-12 loss to a 4-1 Knightstown team. QB Steven Stunda has been spreading the ball around in the Royals' spread offense, and their early schedule should have them prepared. Four of the Royals' first five opponents have combined records of 17-3. The other foe was Scecina, which is 1-4 against a pretty tough Indianapolis schedule. EH's next two foes (ND & Wes-Del) are both 1-4, while Week 9 opponent Edinburgh is currently winless and hasn't won a game on the field since 2002. So, the Royals are hoping that early meat-grinder will lead them to be prepared to have some success in the latter half of the season. This game will be a league game for EH next year, as the school will join ND in the Mid-Indiana Football Conference.

HHC Standings
Delta 3-0/5-0 (#7 AP/#6 IFCA)
Shelbyville 3-0/5-0 (#10 IFCA)
Mt. Vernon 3-0/4-1
New Palestine 2-1/3-2
Yorktown 2-2/3-2
Pendleton Heights 1-4/1-4
Rushville 0-3/1-4
Greenfield-Central 0-4/1-4

Looking ahead
Upcoming CCSN broadcasts
Oct. 2: Mt. Vernon at Greenfield-Central, 7 p.m. broadcast start (other big HHC games that weekend: Shelbyville at New Palestine).
Oct. 9: Eastern Hancock at Shenandoah, 6:30 p.m. broadcast start
Oct. 10: HHC Classic at Lucas Oil Stadium. New Palestine vs. Greenfield-Central, 10:30 a.m. broadcast; Mt. Vernon vs. Delta, 6:45 p.m. broadcast.
Oct. 16: The Boundary Rail Game: New Palestine at Mt. Vernon, 7 p.m. broadcast start (other big HHC games that weekend: Shelbyville at Delta)