The Zion Chapel Rebels hope to keep their dreams of a winning season in reach with a win over Central Hayneville on Friday night.

The Rebels (3-3, 1-3), like most teams closed their doors on Wednesday and Thursday to ride out Hurricane Michael’s arrival. Despite not being in school, head coach Randy Bryant and the Rebels tried to spend as much time preparing as possible.

“We could only have one hour of practice on Tuesday,” Bryant said. “No practice (Wednesday). It’s one of those deals, I tell them all the time to improvise, adapt and overcome. Nothing in the real world goes perfect, so we shouldn’t expect it to on our end. When things happen, we have to adapt with it and change with them.”

The Rebels were eager to practice after last week’s 58-0 loss to Highland Home. The Rebel loss snapped a two-game winning streak. Mentally, the Rebels have been up and down all season and the problem reared its ugly head again last week.

“There were a lot of things that needed to be fixed,” Bryant said. “Number one, in my opinion, was the effort and believing in your teammates. Our team got down early and we didn’t play the way we can the rest of the game. That is something that has stuck with me this week. We were on a two-game win streak, so we took two steps forward and four steps back it seemed like.”

Despite their loss, the Rebels still have a shot at finishing at or above the .500 mark as well as sneaking into the playoffs.

“We talk about our goals all the time,” Bryant said. “We talk about them in the sense of just doing your job and all of our goals will be taken care because of you did what you were supposed to do. We tell them that those things are still in front of them.”

To do that, they will need to get a win over Central this evening on the road. Central comes in looking for their first win of the season. They lost last week 52-0 to Samson.

“They’re a team that will get into a pro formation with two backs and one tight end and try to run it some,” Bryant said. “They will get into spread and try to throw it. We are going to have to go there and execute the game plan. If we do what we are supposed to do, I think we will have a chance to leave there with another win.”

The Rebels fell to the Lions a season ago 40-20.