JOURNAL SPORTS

Expectations are high for the 2023 Evangel Christian Academy Eagles football team.

Understandably, considering the talent returning for coach Denny Duron from a state quarterfinalist team last season.

Friday night’s performance in the Bayou Jamb staged at West Monroe High School gives more reason to rank Evangel not only among the better teams locally, but as contenders for a state championship in December.

The Eagles posted a 21-14 victory over the Ouachita Parish Lions, a perennial Class 5A playoff program.

Tyreek Robinson was the MVP for the Eagles with two touchdowns. He turned a bubble-screen pass into a 76-yard touchdown after he returned the opening kickoff 86 yards. Damarion Drake scored the game-winning touchdown on a 2-yard run. Peyton Fulghum hit brother Parker Fulghum on the 2-point conversion for the final margin.  

ECA opens the regular season next Thursday with another drive east on I-20.

The Eagles face state 4A power Neville, which won a rain-soaked 8-0 decision in Shreveport in the 2022 opener, a game that was the last played on Evangel’s grass field at Rodney Duron Stadium. It was mangled so badly that the school installed artificial turf and played away from home for seven straight weeks, sacrificing three homefield appearances.