Scouting Nixa’s Week Two road contest against Neosho:
The mystery continues regarding Eagles safety Spencer Ward’s tackles total from last week’s win versus Webb City.
The Cardinals’ crack staff of statisticians are by far the best in the COC and it’s perfectly understandable that they may have erred while tracking an opposing player’s totals. Their recording of Ward having 10 solo stops and one assisted tackle sure seemed drastically low.
Nixa has yet to make its defensive stats from the game public.
Expectations were Ward approached or surpassed a 20-tackle night, with perhaps a dozen solo tackles and an assist on a dozen more. He seemingly was involved in every other defensive stop, at least, and Webb City had 61 offensive plays.
Nixa quarterback Drew Blevins posted a 156.3 QB rating last week. …
The Eagles entered this week full of optimism running back Dylan Rebura will be available tonight, after a sprained ankle wiped out his August. …
Nixa’s special teams play has left room for improvement. The Eagles averaged 17.0 yards on their three punts in Week One and missed their lone extra-point attempt. …
Nixa whipped Neosho 65-21 a year ago. The Eagles have scored 170 points on the Wildcats over the teams’ last three meetings. …
Neosho last beat Nixa in 2018. That was also the last year the Wildcats enjoyed a winning season. …
Neosho dropped a 28-21 decision to Willard in Week One. It was Willard's first COC win since 2020, but the Tigers beat the Wildcats at Districts in 2022 and 2021. …
Wildcats quarterback Quenton Hughes was 23-of-38 for 192 yards passing with no interceptions. Those are customary numbers for Hughes. Last year, he was 264-of-385 for 2,836 yards passing, with 28 touchdown and nine interceptions. …
Neosho has almost an entirely new set of skill positions players around Hughes. They put up good numbers against Willard, too. Denver Welch had 23 carries for 112 yards and two touchdowns. Wideouts Hudson Williams and Tyrone Harris combined for 16 catches for 160 yards.
