To put the first ‘W’ into the win column, the San Benito
Haybalers know they’ll have to play a complete football game
tonight when they visit Wilcox.
Hollister – To put the first ‘W’ into the win column, the San Benito Haybalers know they’ll have to play a complete football game tonight when they visit Wilcox.
Offense. Defense. Special Teams.
It’s what coaches have been harping all practice, all week, all season, and a complete football game from the ‘Balers tonight could perhaps get them that much needed victory.
But against a Wilcox squad that put up 42 points last week in its opening game, it won’t be easy.
“They have some good kids that play tough,” Head Coach Chris Cameron said.
On offense, the ‘Balers will have their sights set on running back Patrick Mitchell. Listed at 6-feet-7-inches and 175 pounds, according to maxpreps.com, the senior ran rampant on Terra Nova last week in a 42-35 Wilcox victory.
He may have had only 10 carries, but he racked up 200 yards rushing and three touchdowns. He also added another touchdown off special teams in an 85-yard kickoff return. Mitchell was named Athlete of the Week from the San Jose Mercury News.
“The guy was a one-man wrecking crew,” Cameron said.
The ‘Balers defense doesn’t plan on doing anything special though against Mitchell. San Benito’s run defense has so far been the team’s strength, and defensive coordinator Tod Thatcher plans on bringing the normal ‘Baler ‘D.’
“They have a kid like that every year. He’s one in a long line of pretty explosive backs,” Thatcher said. “The way we combat it every year is try to get all 11 guys to play a good team defensive style of football … We’re going to keep within our scheme.”
Thatcher added that he’s expecting a style of offense from Wilcox similar to last season. Despite the ‘Balers beating Wilcox in a low-scoring 10-7 match last year, while Wilcox defeated Terra Nova in a shootout last week, the Wilcox offense isn’t necessarily feast or famine.
“I think it’s pretty much the same,” the defensive coordinator said. “I think in that particular football game they played a team (Terra Nova) that was kind of a track meet – just back and forth. They’ve done that for years, and our style kind of slows the game down a tad.”
The defense will also have an eye on wide receiver Kyle Barraclough, who Cameron called their “go-to” guy. The 6-foot-2 senior also kicked a 43-yard field goal against Terra Nova last week, Cameron said.
“But we just can’t sit and hang the defense out to dry,” the head coach added, “we need to get some points on the board … We’ve got to score some points. We have to have some successful drives.”
Offensive coordinator Bryan Smith is looking to correct some of the problems last week against San Lorenzo Valley. He said the ‘Balers will look to be more deceptive on offense, and look to throw off Wilcox’ middle linebacker, Matt Turituri.
“We’ll try to counter by using more misdirection and being more deceptive on offense,” Smith said. “I think last week we were pretty predictable in what we did, so we tried to correct those things as a coach and as a coaching staff … We’ll mix it up.”
After the first game of the season against Milpitas, Cameron said the one battle the ‘Balers won was the conditioning battle.
But Smith said Wilcox has a lot of players that play on both the offensive and defensive units. As the game progresses, the ‘Balers hope, they’ll be able to win the conditioning battle once more.
“They’ve got a lot of guys that go both ways,” Smith said. “Hopefully, in the long run, that should be to our advantage.”
But for a Wilcox team that is coming off a scoring spree last week, Cameron knows his ‘Balers will have to be ready to play, on all phases of the game.
“We need to play a complete football game, which we haven’t come close to doing yet,” Cameron said. “A complete football game on all three phases.
“We need to have a sense of urgency and get better.”
