MICHAEL KIRAL / L’Observateur / October 27, 1999

RESERVE – Through the first eight games of the season, East St. John’sfortunes often depended on two factors – hitting the big play on offense and avoiding it on defense.

Through the first five games, the Wildcats struggled doing both, starting off 2-3, including close losses to Lutcher, St. James and Destrehan. Butover the past three weeks, that has changed. The Wildcat offense has beenclicking, scoring 44, 45 and 41 points in victories over Thibodaux, Neville and Central Lafourche, respectively, while the defense has stepped up.

East St. John (5-3 overall, 3-1 in District 7-5A) will look to continue thatlatter trend as the Wildcats travels to South Terrebonne (2-6, 0-4) Friday night. Kickoff is scheduled for 7:30 p.m.East St. John is coming off a 41-21 victory over Central Lafourche Fridaynight. Floyd Smith led a balanced attack, completing 16 of his 30 passesfor 287 yards and three touchdowns. Chuckie Burl ran for 108 yards on 21attempts to lead a Wildcat running game that finished with 200 yards.

Smith is among the metro area leaders in Class 5A with 67 completions in 145 attempts for 1,252 yards and 15 touchdowns. Roy Del Williams, witha 7-catch, 134-yard effort Friday, now has 41 catches for 865 yards and 11 touchdowns to lead the area.

Burl went over the 1,000-yard mark with his performance Friday, and now has 1,056 yards and 10 touchdowns on 177 carries.

“Offensively, the last three weeks, we’ve done well,” East St. John coachRonnie Stephens said. “We are hitting the big plays and running thefootball better. We are helping the passing game by running the footballand we are getting better blocking up front. And they (Central Lafourche)doubled the wide outs, which got them out of the box and that made the running game a lot better.”The defense held Central Lafourche to just over 200 yards in offense.

“Defensively, we are playing a lot better,” Stephens said. “We are notgiving up the big play like we did earlier in the season. We are makingthem work for everything they get. Our kicking game has been solid and weare not turning the ball over on offense and that helps. But the big thing isthat we are not giving up the big play.”This week, the Wildcats will be trying to avoid giving up the big play against a Gator team that is capable of striking fast. South Terrebonne iscoming off a 14-13 loss at Thibodaux in which the Gators out-gained the Tigers 240-180 but turned the ball over three times. One of thoseturnovers, an interception by Jerry Williams of a Jonathan Aucoin pass, was returned 30 yards for a touchdown.

South Terrebonne’s wing-T attack is led by its rushing game. The Gatorsgained 205 yards on the ground last Friday, led by junior wingback Joseph Cooper’s 111 yards on 21 carries. Senior fullback Craig Duplantis leadsthe blocking along with senior linemen Anthony Timperio and Westley Belanger. Aucoin’s favorite targets have been tight ends Chad Mazerac andBrian Carlos and split end Jason Dupre.

The Gator defense held Thibodaux to seven first downs and 98 yards rushing Friday while forcing two turnovers. The squad’s strong point is itsline of LaRonya Aubert and Derek Chelette. The backfield is led by seniorsMyles Lecompte and Scott Domangue.

“They do a lot of clock management,” Stephens said of the Gators. If youdon’t tackle well, they are capable of keeping the ball seven or eight minutes at a time. We have to be able to stop the wing-T and keep themfrom running the clock and keeping our offense off the field.”East St. John closes out the regular season at home against SouthLafourche next Friday.

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