From The Tribune staff reports
MONTGOMERY – Fans are promised a classic battle of two of the state’s premier Class 7A football teams this Friday night when No. 3 Hewitt-Trussville visits top-ranked Thompson.
The defending Class 7A state champion Warriors (11-0) roll into Friday’s AHSAA TV Network/NFHS Network Game of the Week riding a 15-game winning streak. Hewitt-Trussville (9-2) comes in as the last team in the AHSAA to beat Thompson – winning 35-29 in the last game of the regular season in 2019.
Thanks to WOTM TV and its executive producer Vince Earley, this much anticipated rematch will be on statewide and national display Friday night at Alabaster’s Warrior Stadium as the AHSAA TV Network/NFHS Network Football Game of the Week. WOTM TV is also producing a second small-school Game of the Week – B.B. Comer (10-1) at Abbeville (10-1), which will be shown over the AHSAA TV Network of WOTM cable affiliates as well as being live-streamed over the NFHS Network.
Plenty of attention will be directed to Thompson, coached by Mark Freeman, and Hewitt-Trussville, coached by Josh Floyd. The two coaches’ careers and their successes at their current schools closely mirror each other. Consider these facts.
- Hewitt-Trussville played its first season in 1922. The Huskies are currently 450-428-28 overall since that start. Thompson fielded its first football team in 1928 and currently stands at 449-381-14 overall.
- The Warriors and Huskies have played 12 games with each winning six in the series. The two schools split a six-game series played from 1972-78 and have also gone 3-3 in their more modern series – playing six times in the last seven years with each winning three games apiece.
- The series has been close – with Hewitt outscoring Thompson 309-302 in the series – including 194-188 in the last six meetings.
- Thompson’s Freeman and Hewitt’s Floyd are both in their sixth seasons at the two schools. Freeman is 56-14 in that span with the school’s only Class 7A state crown, and Floyd is 56-23 with back-to-back 11-1 seasons in 2017 and 2018.
- Freeman is 220-51 overall with stops at Spanish Fort, Gulf Shores and AHSAA non-member Bessemer Academy. His teams won two state titles at Spanish Fort and four AISA state crowns at Bessemer.
- Floyd, who came to Alabama from Arkansas, is 140-46-1 in 16 seasons with four state crowns and one state runner-up finish at Shiloh Christian in Springdale.
Both teams are loaded with talent this season. Thompson won the regular-season battle 35-21 over the Huskies and Hoover handed Hewitt its second loss 29-28. In last week’s first round of the state playoffs, Thompson beat Grissom 49-7 and Hewitt downed James Clemens 55-12.
This week’s contest can be seen over the subscriber-based NFHS Network and the WOTM TV Network’s cable station affiliates across the state.
WOTM will also feature a playoff game of the week in the quarterfinals and semifinals and will produce all seven state finals at the 2020 Super 7 at Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa in December for the AHSAA TV Network.
The NFHS Network link for the Thompson-Hewitt Game of the Week is:
http://www.nfhsnetwork.com/events/ahsaa/gambf0ad8861b?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=ahsaa.com&utm_campaign=ahsaaweekly