It’s not very often you have a team practicing with more confidence following a loss, but for Zion Chapel practice has been full of enthusiasm following their 48-21 loss to the third ranked Elba Tigers.

“They have had fresh legs and their mindset is good,” said Rebels head coach Bubba Nall. “They have been getting after it in practice. To me that is confidence. We have a lot to play for.”

A win against Pleasant Home on Friday would give the Rebels four wins, which would equal the amount of wins they have had in the previous three seasons combined.

“Our kids want to finish strong,” Nall said. “Finishing 4-6, I think that would be a great first step in our first full year here, and it would be a good step in the right direction for our off season program.”

Although they missed out on advancing to the playoffs, the Eagles also will have a lot to play for come Friday night. With a win the Eagles would improve their to record to 6-4 which would give them their third best record in program history. The Eagles size and the ability to run the football will test the Rebel defense.

“It’s senior night for them on Friday,” Nall said. “They are highly motivated to achieve the third best record in the history of the school. Pleasant Home is huge; they have a couple of running backs that can run and they are hard to stop.”

Pleasant Home will feature both the spread offense, but at the same time will look to pound the football up the middle on the ground.

“They are going to pound on you and then they will turn around and spread you out and throw,” Nall said. “Very few teams can do that and it takes a lot of work to be good at one of them, but they are good at both of them.”

The challenge for the Rebels will be to continue to improve on offense. In the last two games against Elba and Calhoun, the Rebels have averaged 38 points per game. In the previous five games, Zion Chapel averaged just 5.2 points per game.

“We moved the ball really good against Calhoun and moved the ball at times against a really good Elba team,” Nall said. “If we could do that than we can close out the regular season on a high note and bring a lot of confidence into the off season.”

The Rebels have won six of the 10 all time meetings with the Eagles. Kickoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. in Andalusia.