Berrien Springs Shamrocks prepared to battle Dowagiac to get even in playoffs

BERRIEN COUNTY, Mich. -- This Friday means it's another week of high school football in Michiana.

It's week one of playoffs for our Michigan teams, so a loss Friday night means the season's over.

This week's Game of the Week takes us to a battle within the Lakeland League between #1 Dowagiac and #3 Berrien Springs.

Berrien Springs Shamrocks head coach Ben Iliff says it'll be a hard-fought battle between two teams looking to stay alive in the postseason. He tells his team they better come into Friday's game angry that Dowagiac is trying to end their season.

"We've played our best this year when we have that chip on our shoulder mentality," says Iliff.

They're well aware the Chieftains aren't going to make it easy because they're seeking revenge. This playoff game is an exact repeat of last year's first round which ended with a 14-6 victory for the Shamrocks, sending the Chieftains packing. Just a few weeks ago, Berrien Springs shut them out 21-0.

Coach Iliff says Dowagiac's always a tough opponent, despite being 5-0 in meetups over the past three seasons.

"It's been some close games, it's not like we've just walked over them, we don't do that. It's a fourth quarter battle."

"We've beaten them a bunch of times, but they want it bad. We ended their season last year right here on this field, they're coming in angry and we need to be locked in ready to go to win," says defensive tackle Jacob Constable.

The number one key to a Dowagiac defeat will be matching their up-front physicality. "You can't be passive because they're going to be physical," Iliff explains. "You gotta try to match it and go toe-toe with them and try to win more of those 11 one-on-one matchups then they do, and over the course of the game, win more of those plays."

Coach Iliff will be looking to his explosive skill guys to make those crucial plays happen. Despite a strong performance from the defense last time, the line is tweaking their game and looking to keep the Chieftains' offense scoreless yet again.

"We made sure what we did, what we fixed up on defense some of the things we did wrong, we got to run the ball a little better, we got a big breakaway, but we luckily stopped that and got the ball turned over. We're just doing what we gotta do out there," says Constable.

The Shamrocks will not rely on luck; they're going to make sure a win Friday is earned.