The Oak Ridge Wildcats walk down the stairs at Jack Armstrong Stadium before a 41-12 win over Dobyns-Bennett on Blankenship Field on Friday, Aug. 24, 2018. (Photo by Barry Houchin)
The Oak Ridge Wildcats will host Rhea County in a first-round Class 5A football playoff game today. The game will start at 7 p.m. Friday, November 2, on Blankenship Field in Oak Ridge.
The two teams last met in the playoffs four years ago, in November 2014, when Oak Ridge had a thrilling fourth-quarter comeback, narrowing a three-touchdown deficit to one. But the Wildcats were unable to make up for missed opportunities and turnovers and fell to the Golden Eagles 35-21 in a state quarterfinal playoff game. At 12-0, both teams were undefeated before the game, which made it a historic showdown on Blankenship Field.
This year’s Rhea County team has a losing record at 4-5 in Region 4, while the Wildcats are 8-2 and finished second in Region 3.
But high school sports website 5StarPreps.com said that Rhea County, known for its Wing-T offense, is “no gimme” against Oak Ridge.
The winner of tonight’s Oak Ridge-Rhea County game will advance to the second round to play the winner of the first-round game between Clinton, a 4-6 team from Region 3, and Soddy-Daisy, a 5-4 team from Region 4. The winners of the second-round games will then advance to the state quarterfinals.
In the two other Region 3-Region 4 games, Fulton (9-1 and the top team team in Region 3 after last week’s 21-13 win at Oak Ridge) will host Lenoir City (5-5 in Region 4), and Knoxville Catholic (6-3 in Region 4) will host West (4-6 in Region 3).
See the playoff bracket here. You can buy tickets here.
More information will be added as it becomes available.
Most news stories on Oak Ridge Today are free, brought to you by Oak Ridge Today with help from our advertisers, contributors, and subscribers. This is a free story. Thank you to our advertisers, contributors, and subscribers. You can see what we cover here.
Do you appreciate this story or our work in general? If so, please consider a monthly subscription to Oak Ridge Today. See our Subscribe page here. Thank you for reading Oak Ridge Today.
Copyright 2018 Oak Ridge Today. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
