Hixson’s Gill Brown (11) is pressured by East Ridge’s Deangelo Johnson (23) while attempting a two-point conversion.Photo Gallery
My first Chattanooga Football Club game
The star: Hixson senior running back Isaiah Robinson ran a career-high 36 times for 202 yards and two touchdowns.Up next: The Wildcats (8-3) will host Sequoyah (9-2), which beat Central 34-3.
As he continues to build the Hixson football program, coach Jason Fitzgerald’s latest step was to offer some sage advice to his shivering but smiling players late Friday night.
“Guys, I know none of ya’ll have experienced this, but the deeper we go into the playoffs the colder it gets,” Fitzgerald joked. “Get used to it — this is playoff football.”
Led by a punishing offense and a stingy defense, the Wildcats whipped visiting East Ridge 19-0 in the first round of the Class 4A playoffs, just the second postseason win in program history and the first since 1998. Hixson (8-3) will host Sequoyah (9-2) next Friday.
“I said all week that we weren’t going to change anything we do just because it’s the playoffs,” said Fitzgerald, who in his first two seasons has led Hixson to back-to-back district championships for the first time in program history. “We’re going to be simple: Ground and pound on offense and run it right at you. And when you play that style, you aren’t going to blow people out, so you have to play good defense, too, and we sure did that tonight.”