Missouri Military Academy was happy to see progress on Friday.

After the Colonels 53-0 loss at Russellville in their varsity opener two weeks ago, they lost their home opener 19-12 to Veritas Christian (1-1).

Assistant coach Traevonne Smith said MMA (0-2) every year has to teach the game of football to a group of kids that have little to no experience in the sport. That lack of knowledge was apparent in the season opener for the 18 cadets on the roster, but at least more positives could be found in the next game.

“I’m looking for improvement,” Smith said. “They made some pretty big mistakes that cost us the game, but the most important thing is I see some improvement from last game.”

Smith said MMA fumbled the ball two or three times due to poor technique while holding the ball, it jumped offsides on a fourth down and lost its composure that cost the team a first down. Ironing out these issues determines the difference between a win or a loss in a one-possession game like Friday.

Still, MMA wouldn’t be in as good of a position as a one-possession game without some improvement from the previous game. Smith said there are multiple examples of this.

“It’s effort, understanding the play, and lining up right – linemen assignment and technique,” Smith said. “In Game 1, we made a lot of mistakes not knowing where to line up and not knowing the plays. I saw that they caught on a little so that’s definitely a big improvement.”

The first MMA points of the season were via a passing touchdown from Latting Latting to Tyler Isbell.

“We’re a run-based team first so it was a part of the scheme,” Smith said. “We read the linebackers and their linebackers basically blitzed every play so they exposed themselves coverage-wise. That’s when we threw the ball.”

Luke Wolf scored a rushing touchdown in what Smith describes as “another schematic score.”

“He would always bounce the ball to the outside,” Smith said. “When we got in the red zone, head coach (Robert Rosenbaum) told Wolf specifically to make sure that he runs through the hole. Before the play even started, coach called a touchdown on that play. We’re seeing the right things. We just got to execute.”

 MMA has one more varsity game left at 7 p.m. Friday against Linn (0-3), and Smith wants the Colonels to work on having more stamina in the second half.

“They don’t understand the game flow,” Smith said. “They’re not at the level I wish they were at as far as conditioning, running off the field and going 100 percent between the whistle. In the second half, they were gassed because they’re not used to that game tempo.”