Lions head north to Kinder

The Vinton Lions will travel north to Kinder to rekindle a rivalry with the Yellow Jackets on Friday.

“They (Kinder) are definitely a different type of team,” Vinton head coach Wendell LeJeune said. “We have played power teams the past few weeks and they are a finesse team. We are looking forward to that. The real big fullbacks have been giving us trouble with our young kids and our undersized linebackers. They are always well coached at running their offense. It’s been a good rivalry with some close games.”

The Lions (0-3) will be looking to add to their 14 points on the year and hope that the offense will kick in to help their defense.

“The biggest thing is putting points on the board to put a little pressure on the other team,” LeJeune said.

The Yellow Jackets (1-2) have had a tough stretch of games to open the season. After a 28-18 win over Elton to open the season, Kinder has fallen to DeQuincy (37-16) and South Cameron (23-20).

“We are still looking for our identity on offense,” said Kinder head coach Jeff Wainwright. “It seems like each week we find some new problems and we try to solve them to go play four quarters.”

The Yellow Jackets are led by sophomore quarterback Blake Trahan. Through the first three games, Trahan has thrown for 271 yards with three touchdowns while going 18-for-44.

“He’s been doing a little bit better this week,” Wainwright said on Trahan. “He’s just a sophomore, so it’s a lot for him to learn. Each game was a learning process for him seeing different defenses. Last week he had a pretty good game throwing the football. He threw the ball real well for us. We feel good about the way he’s coming along this season.”

The Yellow Jackets also feature a one-two punch in the backfield in Jordan Odom and Ke’Andre Hardison.

“We have a couple different backs that are running the ball,” Wainwright said. “The reason being is that they are all playing defense. We try to rotate them in and out.

“I’m hoping as the season goes on we can settle in on Odom and Hardison being our tailbacks. Last week, Odom has been kind of banged up and it looks like he’s healthy this week. So we had to lean on Hardison a little bit more last week. But they are both feeling good and should be ok for this week.”

Hardison has 222 yards so far this season and Odom has 171 yards with four touchdowns.

Rodney Prosper is the wild card for the Yellow Jackets on offense. Prosper was moved from quarterback last year to receiver this year and already has 112 yards receiving on five catches with a touchdown.

“Rodney is probably our best football player on both sides of the ball,” said Wainwright. “He’s a real good defensive back for us. He’s one of those guys that can go out there and play the slot receiver or play tailback in the backfield. We move him around to where we can get him the football, so he means a lot to our team.”

LeJeune feels that the Lions are close to getting their first victory of the season.

“We approach every week with the chance to get a victory,” LeJeune said. “Football is always a chess game and you think you have a good plan and it’s whether you execute.”

Last week, fullback Stephen Landry led the rushing charge with his first carries of the season for 54 yards including a touchdown run.

“Their fullback Landry looks like a tough runner inside,” Wainwright said. “They do a good job of changing up their veer schemes up to get him the ball inside. I think they are in a good offense.

“They put you in one-on-one situations on defense, and that’s the best you can ask for as an offensive coach. It’s going to take a team effort from our defense to stop the veer attack they are running. We haven’t faced that this year, so I imagine that we are going to have an adjustment period to try to catch up to what they are doing.”

LeJeune hopes that the offense can start opening up the running game on the Kinder defense, instead of a heavy dose of running with their fullbacks.

“We moved the ball on the ground decent,” LeJeune said. “We have to get more kids involved, our fullbacks are doing all of the carrying. We need to widen it out so that we can run a little option to get Joe where he is running the ball a little bit.

“That’s what we are looking for so hopefully by district we’ll get the package.”

Kickoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. in Kinder.