DECATUR – If the preseason prognosticators turn out to be correct the Brownwood Lions and reigning Class 4A Division I Region I champion Decatur Eagles will see each other again, likely with a berth in the state semifinals up for grabs.
Friday night, however, both teams took part in their first scrimmages of the preseason, a 108-play affair that featured just one touchdown – that by the host Eagles.
“To be quite honest it panned out about the way I figure it would,” said Lions sixth-year head coach Sammy Burnett. “The defense at times was dominant and the offense was stumping their toe but that’s what it’s going to be like early in the season. Our defense is going to have to keep us in ballgames and our offense will gel together eventually and figure it out.”
The scrimmage featured 30 plays for each squad’s first-team offense, and 24 for each second offensive unit. On play 29 for the Lions defensive starters, Decatur finally found the end zone on a 5-yard crossing route. Decatur attacked the Lions with short passes, in the 10 to 15 yard variety, to move the chains throughout a significant portion of the scrimmage, yet Brownwood turned away each Eagle advance until the very last.
“The defense played 29 plays really well and they had one pick play on the goal line, which would have probably got flagged, to score a touchdown on the second to last play of the scrimmage,” Burnett said. “It is what is, give them credit for scoring a touchdown which we did not. But I thought our defense played well, especially with not preparing for them and just doing what we do.”
Brownwood’s starting defense did not force a turnover, but did generate multiple tackles behind the line of scrimmage, particularly run plays in the red zone.
Burnett was even more impressed by the unit’s effort considering Decatur caught the Lions off guard on more than one occasion.
“The RPO they were running, we didn’t scheme for that or adjust for that,” Burnett said. “If we see that on film with an opportunity to play them again we’ll have that covered and ready to go. They moved the ball like I thought they would, but our mentality is bend but don’t break and let them into the end zone and we did that for 29 plays.”
Offensively, the Lions moved from their own 30 to the Decatur 37 on the first set of 10 plays, sparked a third-and-5 scramble from quarterback Ike Hall that covered 28 yards. From that point on, however, Brownwood was unable to re-establish the same type of footing.
“We have 10 guys on our offense who are brand new,” Burnett said. “No one on the offensive line has started on the line in a varsity game yet, so it’s going to take time for them to maturate and gel together. Even though their enthusiasm says we’re going to go dominant, I know that’s just not how it works. Decatur came out and did a lot of things we weren’t expecting so that put us behind the eight-ball again. Plus we’re still trying to find our chemistry so I knew we would struggle a bit.”
The front line of Quinten McCarty, Cole Miller, Davis Le, Aidan Packhauser and Logan Knight opened holes for modest gains by Lions running backs Jaylan Brown, Logan McKibben and Noah Gonzalez.
Through the air, Hall’s longest completion was 17 yards to Stone Ratliff on a third-and-7 to keep a march going. Earlier in the scrimmage, Hall just slightly overthrew Carson Noe on a third-and-9 pass that could have threatened for the biggest play of the day in terms of yardage covered.
In regards to identifying immediate bright spots for the offense, Burnett said, “Understanding what their role is, what they’re supposed to do, they did a good job with that. The routes were right, our protections were right to the extent of what we practiced on, but what we didn’t practice on got us. Them getting in a different front and bringing stunts is not what they said they were going to do, but it is what it is and you learn on the fly. The kids kept battling and kept trying to figure it out and didn’t get on to each other. They’re playing as a unit and they will find it and it will click, and it’s our job as coaches to get it done as quickly as possible.”
Among the second-team highlights, the Lion defense picked off a pass on its first set of eight plays as Colton McMillian stepped in front of an intended Decatur receiver. The Lions also forced two fumbles, but the Eagles recovered both.
Highlighting the second-team offense’s effort was a pair of 20-yard runs late by Levi Pearson.
The biggest positive of the night, however, for the Lions was a clean bill of health. No varsity starter suffered an injury, nor even cramped up despite playing in temperatures that approached 110 degrees at the 5:30 p.m. start time.
“We’re very blessed by that,” Burnett said.
As for the earlier portion on Friday’s scrimmage, Burnett said, “I’m really proud of our subvarsity teams, they really dominated and did a good job on both sides.”
Looking ahead to next week, the Lions have three days of practice scheduled ahead of their second and final scrimmage with Lampasas at Gordon Wood Stadium at 6:30 p.m. Thursday.
“We’re going to go back and watch film, figure out what we can do technique-wise to become better and go out there and apply that in the next scrimmage because after that next scrimmage it’s for real against a really good Wylie team that went to the regional finals,” Burnett said. “We’re going to have our hands full the very first game so we have to figure it out quickly.”
