Bulloch Academy tried its best to ride the momentum of securing two wins in its first two games.
    Now coming off of its first loss of the season, this week was spent identifying where improvement is necessary.
    “You see it every year,” BA coach Terrence Hennessy said. “There are places where you maybe don’t focus as much when you’re winning. When a loss comes, you have to take a look at how you’ve been doing things and how you need to improve.”
    Last week, the Gators (2-1) hit the road for the first time in 2017. They put up a much better fight against an Our Lady of Mercy squad that had scored an easy win in Statesboro last fall, but ultimately fell by a count of 32-20.
    Bulloch’s inability to get its defense off of the field was a point of concern, but the Gators have taken steps to address that.
    For the first time in over a week, the wet bulb — a temperature measurement reading that can enact various measures of safety precautions that limit practice capabilities — allowed for a couple of full days of full contact practice. Hennessy said that his team had put forth some of its best practices since camp this week and that he thinks strides have been made.
    “Unfortunately, we’ve had to get really good at practicing in the gym due to heat and storms,” Hennessy said. “We can have good offensive practices like that. For the defense, it really helped to be able to get outside and go full speed.”
    Bulloch will once again find itself on the road this week, this time travelling to Perry to take on the Westfield Hornets. The two schools have met every season since 2008, save for last fall when hurricane rains and school cancellations forced the scheduled game to be abandoned.
    Unfortunately for the Gators, last year’s washout stands as the closest thing they have to a victory over Westfield.
    “We’re 0-for-8 against them,” Hennessy said. “I know records don’t matter from year to year, but it’s something we definitely talk about with our kids.
    “This series started because Bulloch Academy wanted to test itself against the best and Westfield had a run of three straight seasons of getting to the championship game. They might be down this year, but they still wear that green and they still have that ‘W’ on their helmets. And we still have something to prove.”
    Hennessy is right — if not totally underselling the point — when he says that the Hornets are down.
    Westfield claimed state championships in both 2013 and 2014 before winning 11 games in 2015. But last season brought about a coaching change and, more importantly, a slew of graduated playmakers. The Hornets managed just two victories last season.
    The 2017 campaign has started off even worse as the Hornets have been outscored by a combined 87-0.
    "They've got some growing pains," Hennessy said. "But teams will struggle with that much change. The teams they've played are solid and we can't look at those scores and think it will be easy.
    "Like I said — we're still trying to beat them for the first time."