LORMAN &045; There’s no denying today’s Alcorn-Grambling contest will be a showdown of quarterbacks.

All eyes will be on Grambling’s Bruce Eugene and Alcorn’s Donald Carrie, and that’s just how Alcorn head coach Johnny Thomas wants it. Because when the two teams hook up at 6:30 p.m. today at Grambling, the coach is confident one will emerge as the better quarterback of the game.

And he’s confident it’ll be the No. 10 in purple and gold.

&uot;Everybody is talking about Bruce Eugene,&uot; Alcorn head coach Johnny Thomas said. &uot;I’m hoping and praying after this year Donald will make people forget about Bruce Eugene. Donald is one of the best quarterbacks in college football. If he picks up where he left off last year, a lot of people will start talking about Donald Carrie as opposed to Bruce Eugene.&uot;

There’s also no denying the Braves would really enjoy it if they left Robinson Stadium as the victors tonight. The last two seasons the up-and-coming Braves were in position to take the win over two very good Grambling teams but let it slip out of their hands.

Last year was almost gut-wrenching. Two bad snaps on punting situation basically turned the game around.

But both times it was critical mistakes at the end that kept the Braves from knocking off the most storied program in black college football.

&uot;We had them &045; just a couple of plays we didn’t make,&uot; sophomore cornerback Taurian Parks said. &uot;We’ll make them this year. We’re in good condition this year. Last year I don’t think we were in condition to keep up with them. Everybody has been coming out before practice and doing a little extra.&uot;

Coaches admitted at the end of training camp they may have pushed this year’s team harder than any other, and they did it with the season-opener in mind. The Braves have not beaten Grambling in Thomas’ six-year tenure and are hoping they have the team to do it this year.

While Grambling has had very good teams during those six meetings, Thomas knows his squads could have ended that streak any of the last two seasons.

&uot;We’ve found a way to beat ourselves,&uot; Thomas said. &uot;It’s something we’re trying to avoid this year. If we can do that, that’s something we certainly want to take advantage. This game is the first game of the year. Coming off training camp, we’ve been working extremely hard.&uot;

But you can imagine the Tigers know they are the hunted, especially in their current run of success through the conference. So Eugene and the Tigers are gearing up for a fired-up squad, and new head coach Melvin Spears is fully aware of it.

Their defense is getting ready, too.

&uot;Hopefully, we’ll have a more balanced attack, so we can let Bruce Eugene’s supporting cast come through with a little more support,&uot; Spears said. &uot;We want to try to run the ball a little more while focusing on the mid-range stuff for Bruce. We’re going to take what they give us on passing downs.&uot;

The Alcorn secondary is hoping to have a big say in that. In a unit that’s minus three starters from a year ago, the secondary is gearing up for a game that may turn out like it did in 2001 (41-35, GSU) and hopefully not like that crazy game in 1994 (61-58, GSU).

The Braves are hoping to build off the first half of last year’s contest where they nearly held Grambling scoreless until Eugene hit Tramon Douglas on a touchdown pass with less than 10 seconds to go before halftime.

&uot;Everybody thinks our secondary is young, but we had people who played a lot last year,&uot; Parks said. &uot;What we’re trying to do is shut Bruce Eugene down. We really don’t want them to score any points. We know our offense is going to score points. That’s a fact.&uot;

While the Tigers no longer have Douglas, they still have go-to guy Moses Harris at the receiver. But then Carrie has two go-to guys he can turn to in receivers Charlie Spiller and Nate Hughes.

As to who is the better quarterback, you’ll have to wait and see. All Carrie is concerned with is finally getting over the hump against the Tigers.

&uot;We had them both ball games,&uot; Carrie said. &uot;In the fourth quarter, we got a little tired. Or I don’t know what it was. We let them slip away. Our coach has been stressing conditioning, conditioning, conditioning.

&uot;We’ll never say again we lost to Grambling because we were out of shape. If we lose to them, it’ll be because they were a better team.&uot;