OBSERVER File Photo by Ron Szot Pictured above is Dom Gullo forcing a fumble during last week’s game against Gowanda/Pine Valley.

After a convincing home win against Gowanda/Pine Valley last week, 21-0, the Fredonia Hillbillies football team will travel to Allegany-Limestone tonight for another big Class C South matchup at 7 p.m.

The Hillbillies once again will be tasked with battling an unfamiliar opponent, however they were able to watch film from the Gators big 35-6 loss to Franklinville/Ellicottville. Fredonia head coach Greg Sherlock noted that much more can be seen from the film, revealing that it was a much closer game than the score would lead one to believe.

“They kept getting penalties last week,” Sherlock said about Allegany-Limestone. “They have a very good quarterback who is athletic. Sometimes they go with a big backfield, I thought Ellicottville/Franklinville did a good job stopping them last week.”

Coach Sherlock added that he thought Allegany-Limestone just lacked consistency last week, “consistency they didn’t have last week. The only consistent thing about us was our defense.”

Despite not playing to their full potential last week, the Hillbillies are coming off their best week of practice heading into tonight’s game.

“Practice went very well,” said Sherlock. “It was probably our best week of practice. I was hoping after our first game they would step up and they certainly did.”

Along with the great week of practice, the Hillbillies welcomed back Davon McCall as he was cleared to play. McCall will be a key piece returning to the Fredonia secondary. With the clearance of McCall to return to play, Fredonia did unfortunately see a few players get banged up with some injuries last week against Gowanda/Pine Valley.

“We’ve got a few banged up people,” stated Sherlock. “But we did add one. Davon McCall has been cleared to return.”

In Fredonia’s victory over Gowanda/Pine Valley the young offense looked unfamiliar to what most football fans are used to in the area, as they passed the ball about half of the plays.

“I did way too much passing last week,” Sherlock stated about his offense last week. “It’s going to be a good mix. I was limiting our kids to a few formations, we might as well get as good as many of them as we can.”

As talented as their passing game might be, Fredonia would like to give their run game some more looks in their game tonight against the Gators.

“Obviously to rush better this week,” Sherlock said was one of his goals for his team. “We didn’t do a good job of rushing the ball and we have some good backs.”

Last week Fredonia’s leading rusher was their young quarterback Nick Whitfield. Whitfield had 43 yards on seven attempts with two rushing touchdowns. The young quarterback will look to improve in his second start under center and his line in front of him is coming off a great week of practice.

“Especially our quarterback is so young, he’s starting to read the field so much better,” Sherlock said about Whitfield’s improvement. “Our linemen, I hope we did a better job of showing them where they should be blocking to. Personally, I think we just had a really good week of practice. I think we just took Gowanda/Pine Valley too lightly.”

If the Fredonia line can build off this week of practice, the Hillbillies team could be in for a better performance from last week.

“Knowing who we should go to on certain downs, linemen not knowing where to block to,” were among some of the things Sherlock mentioned that needed to be fixed headed into tonight’s game. “When you have one guy out of five stepping the wrong way it opens up a gap.”