PARK HILL — The Central Tigers began their 2024 season with a strong offensive outing in their first preseason scrimmage of the campaign as they scored six touchdowns against the host Keys Cougars.
Quarterback Braxin Goodson hit two TD passes, a 45-yarder to Aiden Cawhorn and a 40-yarder to Gavin Randolph. A third TD pass connection was a 35-yarder from Kiefer Bailey to Kage Poindexter.
The other three scores were on running plays — a 5-yard run by Dillon Miller and a pair of 6-yard TD runs, one each by Xhaiden Mosby and Aiden Smith.
Central coach Jeremy Thompson was quite pleased with his team’s first time under “Friday Night Lights” in a gamelike situation.
“I was very pleased on the offensive side,” Thompson said. “You’re looking for execution. You want to play assignment football. We were pretty simple on what we did offensively, but the execution was there — it was very good.”
Thompson also was pleased with how his defensive unit performed.
“Defensively, you want to see people flying around to the football, playing very physical and fast and pursuing the football,” Thompson said. “We saw that — on both sides of the ball. There are definitely things on both sides of the ball we have to work on, but I was very pleased overall.”
With one more preseason tune-up at 6 p.m. Thursday night at Porter Consolidated along with Haskell, Thompson is hoping his team can iron out the kinks before the season begins at 7 p.m. Sept. 6 against the Heavener Wolves at Tiger Stadium.
“On the defensive side, I definitely want us to react quicker at the snap of the football, reading our keys and being where we’re supposed to be,” Thompson said. “We can’t get away from our assignments. We need to be more detailed on our job. When everybody does their job, then you’ll be successful. We have to concentrate on doing the little things, and we need to get better at that.”
••• To Get There — Take Interstate 40 west to Warner. Take U.S. 266 north to U.S. 64. Take U.S. 64 west into Muskogee to U.S. 69. Take U.S. 69 north to Oklahoma State Highway 51B. Take Oklahoma State Highway 51B west to Porter.
