Friday night may prove to be the toughest challenge that the Cloverdale High School football team has faced this season

Friday night may prove to be the toughest challenge that the Cloverdale High School football team has faced this season.

The Clovers take on the Tri-West Bruins, the two-time Class 2A football state champions, on their home field in the second game of the Class 2A football sectional.

"The key to winning this game is to have a low possession game," CHS coach Jamie Steffy said. "We have to burn as much of the clack as we can on each of our possessions and keep their offense off the field because it can hurt you in many ways."

The plan that Steffy has for this week is the opposite of what happened in last week's victory over South Vermillin, where both teams were scoring on every other possession.

Defensively, the Clovers have been rather strong against the running game this year and a little weaker on the passing side, but in Tri-West's case it doesn't really matter.

"The problem with Tri-West is that it has a really good running game and really good passing game, so we need to be more balanced on the ball, but right now it's the passing game we are concentrating on, because of the big receivers the team has," Steffy said.

The one thing that the Clovers won't be short of according to Steffy, is spirit.

"The team is really excited about this game, after last week there were only 32 teams left in the tournament and we were one of them and that made them feel good. Plus this is a good opportunity for us to go against a team of this caliber and a team that has the complete package," he said.

Steffy does have a hand up on the Bruins -- he knows what kind of offense they run and who they have on their team.

"Tri-West has been running the same game plan for the last two years and have almost everybody returning from their championship team last year. So we know what to expect from them," he said.

Last year the Clovers played the Bruins in the opening round of the sectional at Tri-West and lost. This year they meet again but on Cloverdale's field.

"I wouldn't say playing at home is advantage, it's just nice to be back home for a game like this. We've been on the road for the past few weeks and it just feels good to be back in Cloverdale," Steffy said.

If Cloverdale wins, it will move to 6-5 on the season and the worst it can finish is .500 for the season. But if they lose the will 5-6 for the year. "I am happy and the team is happy they way this season has turned out. We have won five games and that's good for this young team. And we made it past the first round of the sectional so it has been a good year," Steffy said.

Kickoff is at 7 p.m.