Ontario's big win over Wynford back in week six carried over into the Warriors 41-20 victory over Lucas last Friday, as players and coaches say the intensity of practice has picked up over the last several weeks.

"The last two weeks we've brought a lot more intensity at practice and that's shown in the games." Warriors safety Logan Armstrong says.

The junior has 54 tackles and a pair of interceptions in his first season as a starter. The Warriors in general were green on defense to begin the year, with seven starters getting significant playing time for the first time in their careers. But Armstrong says that things are starting to come together in the second half of the season.

"I think we've developed pretty well from the beginning of the season." Armstrong says. "We had a rough start defensively, gave up quite a few points the first few weeks, but these last few weeks we've been able to have good coverage in the secondary and have been doing what we're coached to do."

The man doing a good portion of that coaching is fourth year head coach Scott Kreger who is 23-15 with the program. Even though the Warriors have found success on both sides of the ball at times this season, heading into week eight Kreger still feels like the team is trying to establish themselves.

"We're just trying to find our identity and focus on what we're good at and the things we can hang our hat on." Kreger says.

Perhaps the one aspect of the game that Ontario can "hang their hat on" is the running game with sensational tailback Jordan Campbell. The junior has become the center piece of Ontario's offense, racking up 1,311 yards and 22 total touchdowns through seven games. But the NCC's leading rusher wouldn't have these gaudy numbers without the help of his offensive line, who feel like it is their obligation to make room for Jordan to run.

"We've had movement up front lately and it opens holes for Campbell to run through." Senior left guard Connor Wood says. "Most of our wins have come because of that."

Ontario will look to add another win to their total Friday night when they travel to New Washington for a conference showdown with last years Division VI State runners-up Buckeye Central. The Bucks are just 2-5 this season after being decimated by graduation, but Kreger says Buckeye Central's sub-par record isn't so much about their lack of talent, it's been mistakes that have killed them.

"The games they've lost they've hurt themselves with turnovers and penalties and foolish mistakes, but they're eliminating them each week." Kreger says. "We can't worry about them though, we have to worry about us because we can't bank on them making turnovers and making mistakes."

Wood agrees that his squad can't take the Bucks lightly and that he and everybody else still needs to do their jobs in order to be successful.

"We just treat it like any other game." Wood says. "We don't look at their record, we just look at who they have and we just have to do our assignments every time."

Both Ontario and the Bucks come off wins last week, with the Warriors looking to pile up their third straight victory. Kickoff is set for 7 p.m. at Buckeye Central High School with live coverage of the contest streamed on WMFD.com with replays of the game aired on WOHZ TV Saturday and Sunday at 7 p.m. Live updates of the game can also be found on Twitter from @BrianSkowronski.