Brent Hubbert has coached almost 300 games as a head football coach, playing his fair share of high-stakes games during his esteemed career.

As he looked ahead to his next matchup against Reeltown, he threw out one adjective to describe the upcoming battle.

“It’s going to be awesome,” the three-time state champion coach said. “Talking about the matchups, just ours, we tell our kids daily, if we’re going to be good, you’re going to play teams like that.” Our out-of-region schedule is pretty tough but you’re going to have to play Reeltown, and Reeltown can win in 1A through 4A.”

T.R. Miller is set to face off against Reeltown in the first game of the AHSAA Kickoff Classic this Thursday at 7 p.m., with the contest at the Cramton Bowl in Montgomery.

This will be the first contest between the two programs on the football field.

Reeltown, which finished as the runner-up in Class 2A last season, is ranked No. 9 in Class 2A in the Alabama Sports Writers Association’s preseason football rankings. T.R. Miller, which moved from Class 4A to Class 3A, ranked No. 3 in Class 3A to open the season.

Rebels coach Matt Johnson, who is set to begin his ninth season as Reeltown’s head coach, said that one of the big adjustments headed into the matchup has been finding players to step up both on the field and as leaders.

His squad lost a strong group of seniors, including first-team all-state running back Arthur Woods and quarterback Jake Hornsby.

“The venue is great, all the outside stuff is going to be phenomenal, we know they’ll do a great job with that,” Johnson said. “We’ve just got to, the closer we get to it, reign in and focus on what we’re there for. An unbelievable opponent in T.R. Miller, we know they’re going to be one of the best teams on our schedule. So we’ve got to be ready to play right out of the gate.”

Reeltown’s Baylor Clayton said that it’s been an adjustment for his group to get used to becoming leaders, but have taken on that challenge as senior year approaches.

“It’s just a big step losing them,” Clayton said of the departing groups. “We’ve looked up to them since we were in eighth grade, freshmen, and now it’s us.”

After falling in the Class 2A title game to Fyffe last season, Johnson said his group has plenty of motivation to find even more success in its 2024 campaign, starting with a win against a strong T.R. Miller group.

“We’ve definitely got a chip on our shoulders,” Johnson said. “We had a great year last year, but we felt like we didn’t finish like we could have; we just made some crucial mistakes in that game, and a lot of these guys were a part of that game. Like I mentioned, this senior class, most of them were on the field at some point in that ball game, so that taste is in their mouth of number one, you got to focus each and every week just to get back there.”

T.R. Miller linebacker and Florida commit Myles Johnson said that last season should provide plenty of proof that the Reeltown squad this season is very talented.

“We’re just taking it day by day, trying to get better each and every day,” linebacker Myles Johnson said. “Obviously, Reeltown is a really good team. They went to the 2A state championship last year, so we really have to go hard at practice and prepare a lot. Being from Brewton, we really don’t hear about Reeltown as much as we need to.

“Today, I saw these big ol’ built boys, they’ve got some big guys. I’m sure a lot of my teammates don’t really know, or they just haven’t been aware of, the players that Reeltown has produced.”

The group will be led by a strong group of returners, with athlete Tae Martin and lineman Bowman Brumbeloe returning after making the first-team all-state team in Class 2A last season.

“I’ve taken that role pretty serious of stepping up,” Tae Martin said. “Make sure everybody does right, and if they do wrong, don’t bring them down; just keep their heads up.”

T.R. Miller boasts 16 seniors on its squad, with Johnson and lineman John Robert Jernigan returning from last year’s all-state team. Nathan Commander, a longtime starter at quarterback for the Tigers, will also return as signal caller.

“We are looking forward to playing T.R. Miller right out of the gate,” the Reeltown coach said of his Thursday opponent. “It will be a measuring stick for us. Coach Hubbert does a great job. There’s some history there. We played his teams when he was at Maplesville, and we know he does a great job.

“We also know of the great tradition of T.R. Miller football. We know this is going to be a big challenge for us and a great opportunity for us to showcase our talents and see how we measure up.”

While Hubbert said that depth has been a concern early, his team has impressed him so far in the way that they perform on the field and interact with each other as both teammates and friends.

“I heard a coach say one time, teams that high five and chest bumps, they win, because high fives and chest bumps are about each other and about teams,” Hubbert said. “It’s not spinning the ball, it’s not doing a backflip, it’s not bringing it to me, but it’s fist bumping, high fiving, chest bumping.

“When I watch our film at practice the last couple of days, I’ve been really bad on some of the things and adversity, challenges and mistakes and things like that, but I see our kids going by, when you get that new drone shot everybody has now, you can see them high five, or you can see them chest bump or a little pat on the back to each other when you mess up. Somewhere along the line, that’s going to be a strength for us. I’m excited about that.”