Local football fans welcome another season of high school football Friday night.

Most area teams will be seeing action, and two games that will be capturing the spotlight in opening night action will be the Science Hill Hilltoppers at Elizabethton Cyclones and Greeneville at Kingsport.

The Elizabethton-Science Hill game is always a barn burner and this season shouldn’t be any different as an overflow crowd will fill the stands to see whether the ‘Toppers maintain their stranglehold on the Cyclones or if the streak can be broken.

Elizabethton tasted victory the last time in 2009 against Science Hill.

As always, this game will carry a lot of emotion for both communities as it signals a fresh beginning to a new season.

“It means a lot to a lot of different people,” said Cyclone head coach Shawn Witten. “You get different kids that live on different ends of the town, and you get different people in the community that normally don’t know each other the sitting together during the game.

“You get cheers and you get roars and people high-fiving that normally wouldn’t high-five each other,” added Witten. “It’s just one place where it doesn’t matter where you work or what your job is or what part of town you live on.

“We are out here for the same reason and that’s to cheer our team on regardless if it’s Austin Outland that scores or Corey Russell that scores or if it’s Bryson Rollins that scores—we are all rooting for the same team.”

With the game being such a huge opportunity for his team, Witten, who is entering his 12^th season at the Elizabethton helm, was asked if he still gets the same feeling that Coach Herman Boone had in the football movie ‘Remember the Titans’ when the coach stepped into the locker room and threw up before taking the field for the first big game of the season.

“I used to early on when I first started,” Witten said. “It used to be you didn’t take the field until you took that pre-game ritual.

“I think as you grow and you learn and you get continuity with the people around you, and your preparation, I think you just get more excited—you don’t have the nerves like when you first started.

“The adrenaline just starts to rush and you get so excited about the opportunities,” continued Witten. “Every week is important and every game is important, but there are some weeks different than others.

“It really solidifies why we do what we do,” added Witten. “It really puts into perspective the hard work during the dog days of winter and the two-a-days of summer.”

There is no one that wants to see the Science Hill losing streak come to an end than the highly enthusiastic Witten who readily admits that if everything falls into place and his team steps to the plate with each one delivering what is asked, the perfect opportunity exist.

“I think that football teaches us that it’s the one sport where you need everybody at their position doing their job for the team to succeed,” stated Witten. “In that huddle, everybody has to go to the line of scrimmage and perform their job to the best of their ability or you can’t win. I think that we have to rely on each other. It’s a big task.

“These are the games you coach in and the games that separate big coaches from other coaches. There’s a lot football brings to you on Friday night.”

Both teams will enter Friday night with some big shoes to fill at various positions and the Cyclones are no exception as many new players will be starting in their very first high school game.

If there is one key to the outcome, it will be which team can remain grounded and utilize what has been planted during preseason workouts heading into Friday night’s play.

“It’s so key to get the early momentum whether it’s keeping the scoring zero to zero or finding big plays, a big turnover, or a first score—it kind of gets everybody settled in,” said Witten. “I think both teams are going to have a lot of new faces, and guys are going to be so excited.

“It’s hard for players to control those emotions you know. You get too high or you get too low. You tell them you want them to be level-headed, but you want them to be excited.

“You want them to play with emotion and aggression while at the same time they can’t get caught up in too much emotion because they lose track of what the job is they are supposed to do at that point,” continued Witten.

“Football is all about situations—there’s a score, there’s a time, there’s a position on the field, there’s a down and distance. Every play dictates a certain situation.

“Our message to our team this year is that we have to win with our brains,” added Witten. “We have just got to know the situation and that’s the thing that we have been teaching is to be a smart football player.”

The past matchups between the two teams have seen the Cyclones bringing the beef and trying to establish a ground game to control the tempo of the game, while the ‘Toppers have countered with talented skill players and tons of speed.

Fans may take a double take this season as for all intents and purposes it will look like both teams have swapped players as the ‘Toppers will be bringing to the field a huge size-wise team while the Cyclones have a slight upper hand on the skill positions.

“The roles are kind of going to be switched when you see the teams Friday night,” Witten said about what to expect from a personnel perspective. “They’re bigger with more running backs and not as many skilled kids on the field.

“They will have more of a power game—more line of scrimmage, slowing it down which kind of has been the opposite as we have kind of been the bigger team, ran the football, use of tight ends, fullbacks, with less skilled kids on the field.

“You don’t see Science Hill a lot without a lot of skilled kids on the field and speed on the field,” continued Witten. “They are a huge football team with multiple running backs with a new quarterback. There’s a difference when that quarterback is playing his first year and his first game versus his second year as there is just more experience.

“Jaylen Adams was a different kid his junior year over here in 2016 than what he was over there in 2017. He was more dynamic and made more plays due to his experience from the previous year.

“They are going to control the game with their backs,” added Witten. “They are not going to put the quarterback, A.J. Stewart, in situations where he has to make the play or force his hand.

“It’s just a different Science Hill football team. Obviously, the people that are going to stand out are big 66 and 75. Kendrick Fain is 6’4, 320 at left tackle and then you have Blake Austin at 6’4, 290 at right tackle so those are the names that you are going to see stand out really quick.

“They are almost going to look like a junior college football team when they walk out there,” said Witten. “The deck is stacked against us. We are going to have to play.”

The Cyclone faithful will also have a challenge as they try to keep up with several new players filling new roles in 2018.

“For us you are going to see a lot of new names and a lot of new faces—you are going to see a smaller defensive line for us,” Witten added. “You have the only guy returning that has any experience in Jared Grindstaff. You will have Alex Conley, Zach Hartley, Gabe DePrimo, Joseph Kechter—different kids playing positions. It’s going to be different for us.”

Witten knows for his team to walk off the field with the win, it will start with his offensive backfield—especially the play of senior quarterback Carter Everett who accounted for 2,800 passing yards in 2017 with only four interceptions.

“Our two biggest things going in is that we are going to have to tackle early and execute on offense,” Witten said. “Carter’s decision making has to be so decisive—he’s got to have pin-point accuracy and know where he’s throwing the football.

“It’s critical for us to get a game plan scripted out where he knows the plays that we are going to be running and where the football is going to be going.

“Early on, we just want to get him comfortable and doing a good job of positioning people and get the football scattered around to Parker (Hughes), Corey, Austin, Bryson, and little Zach Hartley—just spreading the ball around as much as we can,” continued Witten.

“He’s the captain of our ship—he just can’t force the football.”

Kickoff is at 7:30 p.m. Admission price for 2018 is $7 general admission. A large overflow crowd is expected as gates will open at 6 pm.