Mules head into playoffs with an opening-round bye

Despite a loss on Friday against one of the best teams in Class 4, the Poplar Bluff Mules will have a bye during the first round of the district tournament.

The Hillsboro Hawks came into Mules Stadium with a wrecking crew on Friday and handed Poplar Bluff its fourth loss of the season with a 56-25 decision but Dave Sievers and his squad will get a little extra time to prepare for their next opponent.

Junior quarterback Jay Edmundson finished with passing touchdowns to Darius Graham and Hunter Clifford while also adding a score with his feet.

Even with their loss and a Cape Central drumming of Potosi, the Mules earned the tiebreaker over the Tigers with their overcome victory earlier this season.

Poplar Bluff will now await the winner of Webster Groves and Farmington, who play this Friday night. The winner of that game will be at Mules Stadium next week for the district semifinals.

After Friday’s loss, Sievers said his plan for the next few days.

“We probably take a couple of days off after school, lift in the morning,” he said. “Spend a week working on fundamentals. We’ll probably have a decent idea of who we’re going to play so we’ll look at the brackets and start getting ready for them. We’ve got some kids that are a little bit banged up. We played hard but this is a good football team.”

The Mules will now play the waiting game as they’ll know who they’ll take on late Friday night.

Poplar Bluff beat Farmington 28-14 earlier this year on the road as the Mules have won back-to-back matchups against the Knights.

Webster Groves is 3-5 on the year with wins over Parkway South, Mehlville and Northwest.