JACKSON LOOKS FOR IMPROVED LINE AGAINST HILLSBORO

Several big guys. One big challenge.

Indian coach Carl Gross was disappointed in the way his offensive and defensive lines played in last week's 34-24 win over Cape Central, and he's hoping for improvement in that area when Jackson plays host to Hillsboro (2-4) tonight at 7:30 p.m.

"We'll have to improve our play on the line of scrimmage," Gross said. "We challenged them this week. Last week, we let some things bother us and we let some of Cape Central get into our head. Instead of playing our position and defeating our blocker, we got caught standing up and looking into the backfield. That really bothered coach (Brandon) Norman and they've been working on that."

On the offensive line, Gross said, "We didn't block people down field. We didn't really hit people, we just got in the way and we worked really hard on that."

With overall size on the line being Hillsboro's strength, Gross hopes his linemen will answer the bell this week. But Jackson has got some beef up front, too. The average weight of a Jackson offensive lineman is 249 pounds.

Hillsboro looms large

"They're big and physical," said Jackson coach Carl Gross said of the Hawks. "They're huge up front. They don't run a lot of fancy stuff, but they're good at what they do."

According to Gross, Hillsboro should've knocked off Farmington (ranked ninth in 4A) two weeks ago, but the Hawks fumbled three times inside the 10 and the Knights mounted a comeback in the fourth quarter. Last week, Hillsboro upended Perryville 50-0. Jackson beat the same Pirate squad 30-3 in Week 3.

"Hillsboro got off to a bad start when their quarterback got hurt," Gross said. "But since he's been back, they've been tough. They're a good football team."

Hillsboro poses a dual threat out of the backfield. Rees Remington has rushed for 394 yards on 75 carries (5.25 average), while Phillip Shearin has 330 yards on 62 attempts (5.32 average).

"They're fairly big in the backfield," Gross said. "They hit the hole quick. They run north and south. They come off the ball, they'll hit you face up and they'll keep their feet going."

But Jackson seems to perform well against such teams. The Indian defense has stuffed the run consistently all season.

But Cape Central may have exposed a weakness in Jackson's defense last week when the Tigers not known this season for throwing the ball too much threw for nearly 200 yards and moved the chains seemingly at will with short passes against the Indians.

But don't look for Hillsboro to follow suit.

These Hawks don't fly

"They'll go with what they do," said Gross. "Coach (Art) Johanningmeier has been there a long time and he knows his bread is buttered with the run. I would be real surprised if Hillsboro showed up with an air show."

Not that the Hawks aren't capable of burning teams with the pass.

"He'll take three or four long vertical shots down the field per game," Gross said. "You can bet on it, but you just don't know when."

Speaking of long, vertical shots, the Indian passing game, which looked impressive earlier this season, has been a bit stale the last two weeks.

Gross also addressed that facet of the game during practice this week.

"We do want to be more effective throwing the football," said Gross. "We know we have the people to do it. We were disappointed that we didn't hit some wide-open receivers last week. We just want to hit the open receiver and play pitch and catch."

The last three weeks, Jackson has relied heavily on the running of Mario Whitney. The junior tailback has rushed for 1,056 yards and 23 touchdowns so far this year. He has three straight 200-yard games.