HELENA -- As Helena High gets ready to enter the second week of the Class AA football playoffs, the Bengals are ready to get back to work.
After a first-round bye, the Bengals will host the Bozeman Hawks on Friday. Bozeman's Kenneth Eiden IV has proven to be a problem for opposing teams since his return from injury, and Bengals head coach Scott Evans said his team knows it’ll be hard to stop a player like Eiden, so the Bengals' hope is to limit his productivity.
"You’re not going to stop him from making plays. We're in a situation where he’s going to make good plays, no matter where he's at," said Evans. "So you have to limit the big plays that he makes. That's our big thing is, you know, you're not going to stop a great player like that. He makes plays all over the field and we're going to make sure, offensively, we don't give him a chance to make touchdown plays."
The Bengals could also see Dexter Tedesco resume his role under center this Friday, as Kaden Huot is currently trying to recover from an injury sustained in the Bengals' regular-season loss against Missoula Sentinel.
"Hopefully, get some more information by (Friday) morning. That's kind of how we’ve been working. Just making sure he's in top health," said Evans. "He'll get checked again (Thursday), and I'm hoping things go well, but like I said, more than anything else is getting him out of the area he was in before, because he had a pretty good concussion."
The Helena Capital Bruins are coming off of a road win against the Butte Bulldogs in the first round of the playoffs and will head to Billings to take on the Billings West Golden Bears. The Bears are undefeated this season and will look to put up a lot of points on Friday night after averaging nearly 49 points per game this season.
For Bruins head coach Kyle Mihelish, his key to the game is how well his offense will stack up against the West defense.
"A big key to the game is going to be what our offense can do against their defense," said Mihelish. "We got to be able to move the ball, we got to be able to move the chains, we can't be second-and-20, we can't be second-and-15."
The Bengals will host the Hawks this Friday night at Vigilante Stadium, while the Bruins will be on the road taking on the Golden Bears in Billings, with both games kicking off at 7 p.m.
