MHSCardinal

Mayfield 28 Hancock Co 0 with 18 secs left in 1st quarter.

Landon Arnett has just tied a Mayfield school record with 94 career TD passes, tying Luke Guhy..

21-0 Mayfield, still 5:08 remaining in 1st quarter..

14-0 Mayfield with 6:30 to go in 1st quarter.

Personally, I think S.Kenton is still the best NKy team despite losing a close game to Ryle.. I also still think Male is better than St X, despite losing to them. When you compare the entire body of work throughout the season, I'd rank Male behind Trinity at #2, S.Kenton at #3, St X at #4 and Ryle at #5..

Belfry probably wins 1 out of 5 against St X or Male and maybe 2 of 5 vs Ryle..

Agree on McCracken, as well..

I'm still trying to figure out the love affair with Cooper. Sitting at 6-4 with a poor loss to Highlands and no real quality wins. I guess playing class factors in a little but they've not really done that either

How Max Preps has them ranked..

I didn't do the rankings... These were based off how Max Preps had them ranked.

This would be the 2a brackets: #16 HAZARD @ #1 MAYFIELD #9 RACELAND @ #8 O'BORO CATHOLIC #13 COV HOLY CROSS @ #4 PAINTSVILLE #12 SOMERSET @ #5 DESALES #15 GLASGOW @ #2 CAL #10 PIKEVILLE @ #7 BEECHWOOD #14 RUSSELLVILLE @ #3 LCA #11 NCC @ #6 DANVILLE

Okay, then, what if you combined 1a-2a, 3a-4a & 5a-6a and took the top 16 teams from those and that would be your 2a playoffs and the next 16 would be your 1a playoff and then the same for the other 2 classes. You'd still have 6 classes and 6 championships. You'd go back from 32 teams to 16 teams per playoff class, but, imo, you could start the season 1 week later and still have your title games the 1st weekend of December. You could play the 1a, 3a and 5a games on Friday and the 2a, 4a and 6a games on Saturday. Here's how those playoffs would look: 1a - #16 B.BROSSART @ #1 LESLIE CO #9 METCALFE CO @ #8 W. VERONA #13 BRACKEN CO @ #4 HOLY CROSS #12 MCLEAN CO @ #5 WILLIAMSBURG #15 MONROE CO @ #2 LLOYD MEMORIAL #10 MURRAY @ #7 FAIRVIEW #14 PRESTONSBURG @ #3 KCD #11 BALLARD MEMORIAL @ #6 BICHOLAS CO @16

They'd definitely be the favorite, but, there's several teams that would give them all they could handle.. CAL and Desales D's are good enough to keep them in the game with a Belfry and high scoring offenses like LCA and Mayfield could potentially, as well. The Pirates likely win every playoff game by double digits in the real playoffs, but, look at how much better the overall playoff games would be from round 1 to round 5..

Here's what the Big School Playoffs would look like; 32 - Fern Creek @ 1 - Trinity 17 - Owensboro @ 16 - PRP 25 - Pulaski Co @ 8 - Lafayette 24 - Tates Creek @ 9 - Cov. Catholic 29 - Dixie Heights @ 4 - S.Kenton 20 - Greenwood @ 13 - Cooper 28 - S. Oldham @ 5 - Johnson Central 21 - McCracken Co @ 12 - Manual 31 - Bryan Station @ 2 - Bowling Green 18 - Ballard @ 15 - Christian Co 26 - S. Warren @ 7 - Male 23 - Southwestern @ 10 - Scott Co 30 - Central Hardin @ 3 - Ryle 19 - Madison Central @ 14 - F.Simpson 27 - Hopkinsville @ 6 - St Xavier 22 - Rockcastle Co @ 11 - Conner

I was just checking out the Max Preps site, looking at the overall state rankings and it got me thinking, what if the KHSAA used some sort of Computer rankings to determine the playoffs and seeding. So, me being bored since UK played early today, ranked the Top 32 teams from Class A to Class AAA and bracketed them out. What would y'all think about a playoff with these matchups: 32 - Lloyd Memorial @ 1 - Belfry 17 - Pikeville @ 16 - Central 25 - Fleming Co @ 8 - Paintsville 24 - Russellville @ 9 - Danville 29 - Western Hills @ 4 - CAL 20 - Bardstown @ 13 - O'Boro Catholic 28 - Hazard @ 5 - Lex'ton Catholic 21 - Somerset @ 12 - Caldwell Co 31 - E'Town @ 2 - Mayfield 18 - Glasgow @ 15 Boyle Co 26 - Adair Co @ 7 - LCA 23 - Casey Co @ 10 - Raceland 30 - Garrard Co @ 3 - Corbin 19 - NCC @ 14 - Russell 27 - Pad. Tilghman @ 6 - Desales 22 - Cov. Holy Cross @ 11 - Beechwood

Here's some interesting stats from all the Cardinal teams who made the State Championship game since 2000. These are just regular season stats, since this years team has yet to play a playoff game: Yr Record Pts scored Pts against #Shutouts # Given -7 Margin of victory 02 10-0 333 74 2 7 25.9 05 7-3 342 115 3 6 20.7 09 9-1 395 147 2 3 24.8 10 10-0 515 92 3 6 42.3 11 10-0 401 62 2 8 33.9 12 9-1 472 161 1 4 31.1 13 9-1 460 212 2 2 24.8 14 9-1 388 95 4 6 29.3 15 9-1 393 123 3 4 27.0 16 10-0 485 156 3 5 32.9

Mayfield's D is solid, a little on the smallish size, but, quick, fundamentally sound and very physical. They've had better defensive linemen in the past, but, the LBs, as a group, are about as good as they've ever had and their secondary has great speed and cover skills, but, are a little on the short side and sometimes they can be out jumped for balls even when the coverage is good. The teams that have had some success against them typically have a very good QB like Cash Jones at McCracken, Dalton Sizemore at Corbin and Shane Burns at Caldwell and good enough OLs to keep the pressure off them and when guys like that have time to throw it, they're going to find some success. Even as good as some of those teams offenses may be, no one has yet had enough offense to keep pace with the Cardinals offense. And, yes, scoring as quickly as they do, does give teams more offensive possessions and good teams will find some success when they get those opportunities. But, to answer your question VOR, the defense, for the most part, is still very solid.

Surely you Desales fans don't really believe what your saying. Comparing scores is not an exact science and different teams match up better with some teams than others. And maybe that common opponent simply played a better more inspired game in one or the other. Plus, it's a little early to be even talking about OB Cath.. I'd think there'd be plenty of other things to worry about before even looking that far ahead, like Glasgow, CAL, etc.. Let's not put the cart before the horse.

1

How does this years version of the Cardinals compare to some of the other recent Cardinal teams? Better? Worse? What does this years team have that some of the past teams didn't? What would be this years Achilles heel/weakness that may cause them to falter in playoffs? Let's limit the comparisons to the 2002 team forward. Too hard to compare teams from different eras..

Caldwell's got a very solid team. IMO, outplayed Mayfield in the 1st half and Cards were having hard time stopping them.. Burns is as good a QB as there is in WKy and the Riley kid is really solid.. They also have a huge FB that's a man child and extremely tough to bring down. Not to mention the solid WRs that can flat out fly and they run great routes. The OL is solid, as well.. They have the pieces to make a long run in the playoffs.. Need to shore up the run D, but, overall, they're a good looking ball club..

Cardinals trailed at the half 21-17, then outscored the Tigers 35-6 in the 2nd half to win going away. Great 2nd half adjustments by the Cardinals to end the regular season at 10-0

Final

Under 5:00 to go in game.. All over but the final score..

After a couple of short runs and a couple of Cardinal penalties, they punt it back to Caldwell, 1st and 10 Tigers at own 14, looks like subs in for both teams now..