Positive yards equal positive steps.

That will be the formula for Butler’s varsity football team Friday night when the Golden Tornado travel to Mansion Park for a 7 p.m. kickoff against Altoona.

“We need to eliminate the negative plays in terms of yardage,” Butler coach Rob Densmore said. “As long as we stay on the right side of the sticks, we’ll be fine.”

Antonio DeVaughn paced Butler’s ground game with 56 yards on 13 carries and Brandon Fleeger threw for 64 yards — 50 in the second half — in last week’s 37-6 loss to Penn Hills.

“Brandon had a case of happy feet in the first half, but I thought he settled down and threw the ball well in the second,” Densmore said. “There’s a learning curve there for everyone — Brandon, the receivers, the pass protection.

“We were extremely physical last week. We showed the physicality I’ve been trying to bring here for two years. We’re going to need it again this Friday because Altoona plays a physical brand of football. That’s how those kids are out there.”

The Mountain Lions have defeated Butler the past two years by scores of 28-10 (2014 in Altoona) and 19-17. They have a new coach this season in Nick Felus, who spent the past eight years as a coordinator with the Coatesville High School grid program near Philadelphia.

Felus is in his first year as a high school head coach. Altoona opened the season with a 43-0 win over Allderdice before losing 42-22 to Norwin last week.

“We’ve got a great group of seniors and they’ve helped in the transition here,” Felus said. “Nobody was guaranteed a starting spot in camp. We basically started over and I wasn’t hired until June.”

Altoona is running a spread offense this year, using trips and quad-receiver sets often. Quarterback Ryan Shope — who threw for 622 yards a year ago — threw for 91 last week. John Russo ran for 58 yards and two touchdowns.

“Those two guys have been outstanding leaders for us,” Felus said.

The coach believes Butler is similar to Norwin in a number of ways.

“They have good skilled players like Norwin and they can play physical like Norwin,” Felus said. “Their schemes seem to be similar.

“One of our biggest strengths is our speed. We’re strong on special teams as a result of that. We blocked a punt and returned it for a touchdown in Week 1.”

After looking at Butler’s film from the Penn Hills game, Densmore said the Tornado’s process now is all about eliminating mistakes.

“Penn Hills made a lot of athletic plays on us,” he said. “We had decent coverage on a lot of those pass plays, but it became backyard football and their athletes won out.”

Running back-safety Dallas Hays left the Penn Hills game early with a back issue, but is expected to play Friday. The Tornado are healthy otherwise.

Inside linebackers Noah Ryder and Logan Dubyak graded out particularly well at inside linebacker, Densmore noted.

He said Altoona’s offensive and defensive packages are totally different under Coach Felus.

“You can’t make any comparisons that way to what they were last year,” Densmore said. “That physicality is still there, though. When they hit us, we have to be prepared to hit back.”