After last weekend’s cancellation the Buccaneer football team will be back on the field for the first time in two weeks Saturday night in Memorial Center against Western Carolina.
In what has been a very competitive rivalry over the years, the Bucs will be looking to avenge their 39-27 loss last year in Cullowhee, N.C., and will enjoy being back on the playing field after last week’s tragedies.
“I’m excited about playing football again,” said head football coach Paul Hamilton.
“This is a special time of year for people in our community and our country and I’m excited to have the opportunity to coach and our players are excited to play this weekend.”
Hamilton and his team had to deal with the indecision of the Southern Conference on whether football would go on during the weekend.
Last Tuesday the Bucs were set to play VMI as they prepared all week for Saturday’s matchup, then at the end of Thursday’s practice Hamilton learned the game had been postponed.
“It was strange this time of year to not be playing Saturday afternoon or Saturday night,” Hamilton said. “We made the right choices last weekend.”
The Bucs have been back to the business of college football this week in preparation for their first game of the Southern Conference schedule.
“We knew we had to get back to work to (be ready to) play an outstanding football team Saturday night in the opening game in the league,” Hamilton said.
“It’ll be important to get a win in our opening game.”
The Bucs dropped their contest with the Catamounts last season in raining conditions that made Western Carolina’s field extremely wet and slippery.
“They whipped us in all phases of the game last year,” Hamilton said. “They beat us pretty good and their team will be better this year.”
The Bucs will have home field advantage in this year’s contest and have won the last three meetings with the Catamounts in Memorial Center.
Hamilton knows that home field advantage will not be enough and has much respect for the Catamount squad.
“We’re playing a team that has a chance to be very successful in our conference,” he said. “They have a majority of their players back from last year and they will give a lot of people problems in the conference this year.”
The Bucs will have to do a better job of shutting down the Catamount’s running game if they are going to be successful in this year’s contest.
“I give a lot of respect for their tailbacks,” Hamilton said. “They took it to our football team (last year).
“If they can run the football like last year, we’ll have problems.”
The Buccaneer defensive line will be in charge of shutting down Western’s running game and lineman Kai Shreckenberg looks forward to this week’s game and believes the defense will be ready.
“Our defensive front is more experienced,” said Shreckenberg, who had three tackles in last year’s game. “We’re all embarrassed from last year and the team is ready (for this game).
“The defensive line did not get the job done last year. Their offensive line controlled us and that will change this year.”
Another aspect of the game that the Bucs will have to improve on from last season is taking care of the football, as they lost three fumbles and had two interceptions in last year’s game.
“Offensively last year we killed ourselves with turnovers,” Hamilton said. “We have to maintain consistency.”
The Bucs will hope to have starting running back Corey Carter and preseason All-Southern Conference honoree Ocasio Cofield back for Saturday’s game.
“We should be back to full strength,” Hamilton said. “We’ll be better going into this game than the Pittsburgh game.”
ETSU and Western Carolina have faced each other 42 times with the Catamounts holding the series lead with a 21-20-1 record.
The Bucs will be hoping to even that series this season.
“It’s been a very competitive series between two Southern Conference teams that play well against each other,” Hamilton said.
The kickoff for Saturday’s game is set for 6 p.m.

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