WORTHINGTON -- After last week's loss to the Pipestone Area Arrows, the Worthington Trojans are hoping they can pick up their first win of the season against the Windom Area Eagles.
But first, the Trojans will have to get over their disappointing play against the Arrows last week.
"It was a tough one to take at home against Pipestone," WHS coach Brad Grimmius said. "We thought we matched up well with them, but once we got behind the 8-ball it was kind of hard to play catch-up with them."
Despite taking their third loss in a row, Grimmius has his team moving past the loss and focusing on the task at hand. The task for this week is preparing for Windom.
"Any time you take a loss, you don't feel really good all weekend," Grimmius said. "Then you start to game plan for the next game, so you start to feel better. It was really a pick-me-up week for the players to get their attitudes back to where we want them as a coaching staff."
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With all the things that went wrong in last week's game against Pipestone, Grimmius knows it might be easier to worry about what went right for his team in the game rather than point out what went wrong.
"There weren't a lot of things that went right for us in that game," Grimmius said. "We didn't pick up their blitz on the offense. They contained us defensively. Once we got behind, it was almost like we lost track of everything."
That loss of focus once the Trojans fell behind against the Arrows is one thing Grimmius wants to make sure doesn't happen again.
"In the game of football, it is all about how mentally tough you are," Grimmius said. "The question you have to ask is, if you get behind, do you have the character to come forward to win the ball game?"
Over the last few weeks, Grimmius and his staff have been trying to build up the teams' confidence and character through drills at practices. This week's main focus at practice was building competition within the team to make them play harder.
"The one thing we started doing last week was building character and this week is trying to build a lot of competition in the drills," Grimmius said. "To get these guys to learn that you have to play to win each down, you have to do that at practice."
Another thing the Trojans are working on in practice this week is trying to contain the quarterback, which they failed to do at times last week against Pipestone.
"It is going to be a lot like last week," Grimmius said. "They have a good QB like PA have last week. This one has a lot more speed though and he likes to run the ball when he gets to the edge."
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On the other side of the ball, Worthington is going to have to be more physical in order to get their offense off the ground against Windom.
"Offensively, we have to win the battle of the trenches to get our offense going," Grimmius said. "We have to physically win the battle up front. If we can do that, it is going to be a good ball game. If not if might not be pretty for us."
Even though the Trojans are 0-3 going into this week's game, Grimmius has been telling his players not to give up hope that they can still turn this season around.
"I told the team that the season is not over by any means," Grimmius said. "So let's see if we can't get this thing going in the right direction."
The Trojans head to Windom Friday for a 7 p.m. kickoff against the Eagles.
Daily Globe Reporter Jordan Willi
may be reached at 376-7335.
