“When I was a coach at Edgewood, Brian was an assistant at Ross,” Stubbs explained. “We both taught classes at Butler Tech together and we’d see each other at staff meetings over there. ... And I taught his daughter Sara in fifth grade when I was still at Edgewood.
“But on this football Friday night, we won’t be friends,” Stubbs added with a smile.
Butts said the friendship helped him get out of a lot of explaining when the two schools traded game films earlier this week. The Ross team buses got caught up in a traffic jam on their way to last week’s game at Goshen. As a result, it took the camera crew a couple series to get their equipment set-up for the game.
“I told Brett that he wouldn’t be able to see film of the first two series from our game,” Butts said. “I explained what happened and, as friends, he knew I was being honest about that. It makes a touchy situation nicer when you know that it’s your friend you’re talking to.”
Butts said the friendship will be on the bench during the game, however.
“We expect it to be a much more difficult game for us than the win at Goshen,” Butts said. “I’m impressed with Monroe’s backs and quarterback. They’ve got a lot of team speed, and I’m worried about that a little bit.”
Stubbs said his team is still stinging from the Little Miami loss.
“That was a tough loss for us,” Monroe coach Brett Stubbs said. “Losing late in the game like that is tough. We felt like we controlled the second half, for the most part. They had one big play and that helped them to score the tying field goal. And then we made a couple ... we call them selfish plays, where our kids just made some bad decisions that hurt us field position wise, and they were able to get another field goal to get the lead.”
Stubbs said the Hornets players talked after the game about not letting another late-game letdown happen again. Both coaches expect a raucous crowd for Friday’s game.
“It’ll be our second day back to school, and when we’re in school we get a bigger crowd for our games,” Butts said. “And Monroe always brings a big crowd with them. It should be a fun night.”
Just not a friendly one.
Contact this reporter at (513) 705-2851 or jbombatch@coxohio.com.
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