The Tobacco Bowl between Grayson County and Edmonson County is less than two weeks away and the Cougar football team is taking every potential moment they can to prepare.
To continue that preparation, the Orange and Blue traveled to John Hardin last Friday evening to participate in a “jamboree” football scrimmage.
Typically, this style involves multiple teams who will rotate in and out. An offense would get 10 plays to try and score against a defense and then the rotation would begin.
Due to multiple teams backing out at the last minute, this forced things to change and the offense was guaranteed only five plays to try and score from the 40-yard line.
“It’s hard to kind of get in a rhythm sometimes when you’re on offense for five plays,” head coach Bryan Jones said after the game. “Then the next time you’re out, you’re against a different defense. You know, Fort Knox is playing an odd front. John’s playing even front.”
This made it to where there wasn’t a score to report per se. However, that doesn’t mean that the opportunities to improve weren’t there.
“We’ll get a feel for trying to put some of the pieces of the puzzle together because we came in, you know with some some uncertainties on who’s going to play where and we got some people fighting for some jobs,” Jones said. “We’ll be able to go back and watch some film and maybe make some headway in that department and next week there’ll probably be far less rotation at some positions.”
The biggest question for this year’s edition of the Cougar football team will surround the offensive line. Last year’s historic season ended with the team needing to replace four starters up front.
Friday was one of the first opportunities for the new look group to gel albeit without a key returner.
“I think at times they looked pretty doggone good and I think at times they look pretty doggone rough,” the Cougar head coach said about the offensive line. “Wynsten Woosley, you know who will play a lot of snaps for us up front. He’s out this week and next week, you know, trying to make sure that he’s ready for the season. He’s probably our most knowledgeable guy and maybe our most experienced that we don’t have up there that probably brings some security when he is in there.”
The coaching staff worked in a rotation at multiple positions in trying to find the grouping that would work best against Edmonson County.
The next step in that process is a home scrimmage this coming Friday against Spencer County where Jones will whittle down the position battles.
“I think we’ll lock in on a few positions and you know unfortunately some guys will get some less reps that we’re probably getting 50% of them,” he said. “They’re going to get less now, and the guy that’s probably going to play there is going to get more so that should help us grow a little bit faster.
Friday night’s game will start at 6:30 pm at Cougar Stadium with the team hosting their Wall of Fame induction starting at 6:15 pm.
The 2024 regular season is set to begin on August 23 against Edmonson County.
By Sam Gormley, Play-By-Play Announcer/Local Sports
Reach Sam at sam@k105.com
