St. Louis Catholic’s defense was lights-out last week, holding Crowley to a pair of touchdowns.

The Saints look to repeat the performance today when they host Iota at Sulphur High School’s Matt Walker Memorial Stadium.

“I like the energy we came out with,” St. Louis head coach Brock Matherne said. “We were ready to play.

“We had a little delay with lightning, but I like the way the kids responded. We never got too high or too low. I was real pleased with the execution and physicality we played with on Friday.”

The Saints (1-0) forced five turnovers with Kade Nugent and Luke Mere getting a hand on two apiece.

“It is a relentless pursuit to the ball, and when we get to the football it is getting it out,” Matherne said. “We don’t care about yards.

“We don’t care about anything but points. We feel like we can take the ball away from you anywhere regardless of where you are at. We teach our kids to get after the ball.”

St. Louis’ defense will have its eyes on Iota running back Tyler Charlot. Last week, the senior, who played his first game since an ACL tear during Week 2 last season,  rushed for 203 yards and two scores.

“Against Iowa, he (Charlot) still has his vision, and we saw the burst he had last year,” Iota head coach Josh Andrus said. “He had a 73-yarder and outran everybody.

“To be able to do that against Iowa, who had the 4×100 relay state champs in 3A, we are real excited to see that again.”

The Bulldogs (0-1) fell behind 22 points against Iowa before pulling within one score in Week 1.

“We are working on finishing,” Andrus said. “I thought we did good to fight back to get into the game when we got down big in the first quarter.

“We have to learn how to finish out the game and keep the pressure on them when we get into the third and fourth quarter.”