This is it.

Second-seeded Brookings (10-1) takes on two-time defending-champion and No. 1 Pierre (11-0) in the Class 11AA title game Friday at noon at Dana J. Dykhouse Stadium.

“It’s a tough week in regards to the idea that we’re playing the best team that we’re going to play all year,” said BHS coach Lee Schmidt. “We’ve seen them once; we know what we’re going to get. It’s the idea of all the distractions and things that are going to be going on. We go to school every day and focus on what we have to get done at school and then we go from there to practice and really hone in on not making the same mistakes we did last time. I’m pretty sure the kids have spent a lot of time on Hudl watching film. That’s one thing we’ve been hammering about all year, but we’ve really been checking up and making sure kids are getting at it because it’s all about the mental picture – (correct) the things that we didn’t do well.

“We did a lot of things well, we just – when things started going bad then we started going bad. That can’t happen; too good of a team we’re going to be playing, we need to stay on task and stay focused and we’re going to have to bring the physicality – there’s no doubt about it. We’re going to have to be more physical than we were last time and take care of the football and just … we’re going to have to play good football. There’s no doubt about it and the kids know that and that’s the one good thing about us having already played Pierre once, they kind of know what they’re up against.”

Last time

Pierre beat Brookings 54-6 at home on Oct. 11

The Governors led 7-0 after a quarter, 33-0 at halftime and 47-6 through three.

Garrett Stout threw for three touchdowns, ran for another and added a kick return to paydirt.

Maguire Raske recorded two TD rushes and a kick return.

Bobcat defense

The Bobcats have allowed 124 points – nearly half of those came in the road game against the Governors – while posting a trio of shutouts.

“Our defense up front has been really solid. Our linebacker play has been outstanding – they’re our one, two and three tacklers on the team,” Schmidt noted. “Part of that has to do with guys up front doing their job and doing what they’re supposed to do to protect them and keeping them free so they can get to the football.

“Those guys have played solid all year, but the group that played really well the other night – other than the one big play they gave up – is our secondary. The play in the secondary has gotten better and better and better, and that’s really a key for this game because we got hurt with the passing game the last time we played at Pierre. They were able to get some long passes and long plays out of the passing game to go with their already well-established ground game. We can’t let that happen. We have to keep that under control, take away some of those things and play better in the secondary than we did the first time. And I think we will, because we have improved a great deal.”

Joe Prusa and Gus Miller are the interior defensive linemen, while Rhett Zelinsky, Brock Longville and Theo Burns are on the ends.

The dynamite linebacker trio is composed of Caden McKeown, Brady Ammann and Wes Koenig.

Koby Bartels has four interceptions and Ammann also has four takeaways (two INTs/two fumble recoveries).

Brookings is plus-15 in turnover margin with 23 takeaways.

Bobcat offense

Balance is the name of the game as 12 different players have found the end zone – 10 on offense.

Brookings has 56 touchdowns.

TOUCHDOWN TRACKER

Rush Rec. Total

Carter Eidem 13 1 14

*Tanner Shepardson 11 0 11

Parker Rykhus 8 2 10

Preston Helmbolt 2 3 5

Matt Girard 5 0 5

Max Struck 0 4 4

Cody Caraway 2 0 2

Jackson Krogman 0 1 1

Rhett Zelinsky 0 1 1

Hunter Gray 1 0 1

   *Shepardson has 12 TD tosses

   Others: Caden McKeown has a kick return and Koby Bartels an interception return.

Payton Theodosopoulos is 38-for-53 on PAT kicks and 4-for-7 on field goals.

“We’re going to have to spread the ball out; they’re not going to let us do one thing over and over again – they’ll take something away,” said Schmidt. “It still comes down to, between Eidem and Rykhus and Girard – we’re going to have to get some running game out of those guys; and, of course, Helmbolt off the fly sweep. They’re all capable of busting some big plays; they’re all capable of getting yards for us.

“And as the game goes on, we’ll see if they change anything that they’re doing against us – we’ll have to make adjustments and see where we’re going to have to attack and what we’re going to have to do.

“But, yeah, having that variety, having that number of differences … and I think, for the most part, Shep throwing the ball vertically has been better, too; so receivers have been getting a little more involved in our offense, as well. And we’re going to need that, because they’re going to have eight in the box.”

Couple of keys

“The biggest key is not giving up big plays and not allowing any short fields, which means we can’t turn the football over and we’re going to have to establish a lot more offense than we did the first time,” Schmidt added. “We’re going to have to have possessions – that doesn’t mean score every time, it just means move the football, flip the field position … and we need to sprinkle in some big plays and get on the scoreboard.

“We’re going to have to score some points to win this football game and last time out in Pierre, we scored one touchdown and that’s all we scored. So we’re going to have to be able to run the football and we’re going to have to be able to make some big passes – those are pretty much the keys.”

Governor stats

Pierre is outscoring its opponents an average of 61.64-6.64 this season, including 80-3.5 in the postseason.

The Govs hung 103 on winless Spearfish in the postseason opener.

Pierre has allowed just six first-half points (West Central on Sept. 6 in Hartford) this year and its average halftime score is 45.73-0.54.

It is plus-10 in turnover margin with 22 takeaways while recording 44 sacks.

Pierre (halftime score in parenthesis)

Aug. 31 – W 40-0 vs. Sturgis (33-0)

Sept. 6 – W 46-6 at West Central (34-6)

Sept. 13 – W 63-0 vs. Yankton (63-0)

Sept. 20 – W 52-27 vs. Tea Area (35-0)

Sept. 27 – W 72-0 vs. Spearfish (48-0)

Oct. 4 – W 55-20 at Huron (35-0)

Oct. 11 – W 54-6 vs. Brookings (33-0)

Oct. 18 – W 75-7 at Mitchell (55-0)

Oct. 24 – W 61-0 vs. Douglas (58-0)

Oct. 31 – W 103-0 vs. Spearfish (75-0) [quarters]

Nov. 8 – W 57-7 vs. Mitchell (34-0) [semis]

Garrett Stout is 138-of-215 for 2,292 yards with 37 touchdowns and a pair of interceptions through the air. He’s added 1,432 yards on 109 rushes (13.1 average) and 20 scores.

Additionally, Stout has returned all three kickoffs he’s fielded to the end zone – averaging 89.3 per return – and has a 53-yard pick-six.

Maguire Raske’s rushed for 1,008 yards (8.9 average) and 16 scores. He has 28 receptions covering 458 yards with five TDs to go with a 91-yard kick return to paydirt.

Regan Bollweg is the top target with 39 catches for 825 yards and 11 touchdowns. Five others have at least three scoring receptions, with Zach Letellier recording seven.

On the other side of the ball, River Iverson has 93 tackles, Gunnar Gehring 66, Cobey Carr and Josh Rowse 50 apiece, Cade Hinkle 49, Chase Sattgast 47 and Grey Zabel 44.

Bollweg has 11 1/2 sacks, Gehring 10 1/2, Zabel nine and Sattgast six.

Hinkley has seven interceptions, two of which he’s returned for touchdowns to go with a 71-yard punt return.

Note: The Govs are averaging 89.8 yards on four kick returns, all of which have been returned for touchdowns.

Home, but not home

The Bobcats are playing in Brookings and on the field where they play all their home games.

However, it’s not as much of a home game as some may think.

“We’re not actually playing on our home field – we play our games there. It’s not the facility that we go out and practice on every day like most teams are practicing on their home fields that they play on every day. That’s not the case for us,” Schmidt noted. “That doesn’t make any difference; Pierre doesn’t care where they’re going to play and they’re good at any place, any surface on the road or at home. So we have to take care of our business, we have to do what we do – it won’t be a lot of changes to what we do, I mean, we just have to do what we do better.”

Brookings will also be the visitors on the scoreboard.

With that said, the Bobcats have allowed just 33 points in seven games at DJDS this year with a trio of shutouts.