Prep Football Preview: Trying to Stay Alive

In terms of playoff implications, Harrisburg is on life support right now.

At 2-4, Harrisburg has to win out with three games left on the docket, starting tonight at Murphysboro.

The Red Devils would like nothing more than to pull the plug.

The Bulldogs have owned Murphysboro the better part of 18 years as the Red Devils have not knocked off Harrisburg since 1995.

Under Gary Carter, Murphysboro has seen a resurgence the last couple of years, especially at the lower levels that have made the Red Devils one of the top teams in the Southern Illinois River-to-River Conference Ohio Division.

The Red Devils' lone loss come to Herrin and in that loss, Murphysboro proved what kind of club they are to Jason Roper.

The Harrisburg head coach knows he'll have his hands full tonight at Doc Bencini Field.

"On film they look fast and athletic," Roper said. "The QB throws the ball really, really well. It's going to be a tough matchup for us at Murphysboro. We're still nursing some injuries. Hopefully our kids will bounce back from last week in what was a disappointing loss and go out play hard and compete."

Murphysboro is fresh off a huge 63-6 win at West Frankfort last Friday. The Red Devils only two losses are against state ranked Herrin and SIRR Mississippi foe and undefeated Carterville.

Still, the mindset of do-or-die hasn't sunk into the Harrisburg locker room yet according to Roper. The focus is now on Murphy, a team Roper knows the Bulldogs are going to have to play really well defensively, to come out on top.

"We really haven't talked about it," he said. "We try to take it one week at a time. I know our kids are disappointed we lost a couple of games, Du Quoin and Benton, that we feel like we should have won and you move those two losses into the win column and obviously we have more breathing room.

"Sometimes you don't play well and you have injuries or things happen that you come up a little bit short and in both those games we did. We had an injury at our quarterback position with Noah Vallette still out and Corbin Crim filling in. Corbin had a little more pressure on him last week to do some things and we had chances to make plays and win that game and we didn't. "

Michael Dann covers prep and college sports for the Harrisburg Daily Register. Follow him on Twitter: @spydieshooter.