Anderson County battles West High School on Rivalry Thursday

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WATE) — The West High Rebels are looking to hand Anderson County its first loss of the season.

West came into this year back-to-back state champs, with just one loss over the past two seasons. The Rebels enter tonight’s matchup against Anderson County with a 4-3 record on the year.

Those three losses include a triple overtime loss to Bearden in week one and then losses to Alcoa and Maryville. So while West may not look like typical West on paper, Anderson County head coach Davey Gillum says you can throw that paper away.

“The paper lies, I’ll tell you that. And you can ask Alcoa and the rest of the guys, that’s a really good football team. Maybe a little more youth they’ve had on the field than they’ve had in the past. That always plays a role, especially early in the season but if you go back and watch Alcoa, the difference in the game is a play here, and a play there and some of that inexperience may manifest itself early in the season but probably the best defense we’ve seen all year,” said Gillum.

One of the questions heading into this year for Anderson County was how do you replace Nick Moog , the running back who was the backbone of the Mavs ground game. Well, it seems like Anderson County’s rushing attack hasn’t missed a beat without him, thanks to Waylon Larue. Now that he has the opportunity to be RB1, he has fully taken advantage of it. Larue is coming off a 225-yard, three-touchdown performance against Clinton.

The Mavs averaged at least 45 points per game over the past few games, in big part thanks to Larue. However, the offense will face its toughest defense yet tonight against West.

EDITOR’S NOTE: The game will be live-streamed in this story with coverage beginning at 6:30 p.m.

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