ST. MARTINVILLE — Coach Vincent DeRouen and St. Martinville Senior High go for their third straight win when the Kaplan Pirates come to town Friday in a District 5-3A football game.

The Tigers got off to a 1-4 start, but those losses were to Class 5A Lafayette High, as well as three programs in Westgate, Notre Dame and Cecilia with a combined record of 17-4.

Since then, SMSH defeated Erath in a district game before stepping out of league play last week to down reigning Division III state champion St. Charles Catholic on the road.

“It looks that way,” DeRouen said when asked if the tough non-district schedule was paying dividends. “We still feel like we left some plays on the field and some games out there we could have won.”

The Tigers have the No. 14 LHSAA Division II non-select power rating. They are ahead of 12 other programs that have winning records and are the only school in the top 22 that has a sub-.500 record.

“If we could’ve won some of those games, we could be sitting in a better situation,” said DeRouen, who lost one of his team leaders when his son Ahman DeRouen suffered a season-ending knee injury in Week 4.

“When Ahman got hurt, I think the defense was feeling sorry for themselves,” Coach DeRouen said. “We didn’t recover until now, and we’re still trying three different kids at his position.”

That being said, DeRouen added that his defense has steadily improved over the past two weeks.

“We’re tackling better,” he said. “We were always in the right spots. The coaches did a good job of working with the kids with tackling, and the kids were receptive. Now that we’re tackling, it’s like magic.”

The Tigers will need to continue that trend Friday against Kaplan (4-3, 1-1), which has the area’s second-leading rusher in senior fullback Caden Campisi (200 carries, 1434 yards, 18 TDs).

“The defense is starting to get confidence and hit their stride,” DeRouen said. “It was puzzling because we had nine starters back,

“We have to continue to tackle well. Kaplan does a good job with the Wing-T offense. It’s hard because you tell everybody to get to the ball, but with the Wing-T, there is so much misdirection that you have to stop, read it and then tackle.”

The Tigers will counter with the area’s leading rusher in junior Stephen Blanco (1,460 yards, 21 TDs), along with quarterback Kaden Zenon and receivers Harvey Broussard and Cullen Charles.

Broussard, a 6-foot-4 senior, is averaging more than 22 yards per catch.