wildstangs
08-12-2006, 04:38 PM
By RON HOWELL/Reporter Sports Editor
Changes may be coming for the 2006 Sweet-water football team when it plays its new sched-ule this fall, but the winning is likely to continue.
That's because the Mustangs should be explosive again on offense - they return a pair of 1,000-yard rushers - and they have a lot of returning talent on defense as well. Sweetwater will need all that talent to compete well in its new 7-3A district, which retains Wylie and Clyde and adds Breckenridge and Comanche.
Sweetwater plays at Wylie - which has handed the Mustangs their only district loss each of the past two years - on Oct. 27. Both teams are state-ranked by Texas Football with Sweetwater No. 12 and Wylie is No. 18, according to the pub-lication, which ranks the top 25.
The Mustangs and Bulldogs have also shared 4-3A district honors with Snyder (now in District 3-3A) the past two years, and they were a combined 23-5 in 2005 with Sweetwater (13-2) making the Division II semifinals and Wylie (10-3) going to the Division I quarterfinals.
But forgive head coach Kent Jackson for not concentrating on Wylie. He must worry about a Murderer's Row non-district schedule that could make it tough for the Mustangs to match last season's 13 wins, which equalled a school record.
Sweetwater begins this season Sept. 1 at Class 4A Wichita Falls, a tradition-rich program which was 6-4 a year ago. The Mustangs will then face an even more tradition-rich Class 4A school - Brownwood - a week later when they host their second annual Sammy Baugh Classic.
After that, Sweetwater plays three consecutive road games starting with a trip to Brownwood's Gordon Wood Stadium on Sept. 14, where the Mustangs have a Thursday night game against Decatur at the Gordon Wood Classic. After that, Sweetwater has road contests at Canyon and Big Spring before finally returning home Oct. 6 to play Borger in its last non-district game.
Brownwood, Decatur, Canyon and Big Spring all made the playoffs in 2005, while Borger and Wichita Falls missed but still had identical win-ning records of 6-4.
Canyon was a 10-2 regional semifinalist last year, losing 39-36 to Wylie in the second round. The Eagles and Borger are picked by Texas Football to finish 1-2 in District 5-3A. Big Spring, of course, was in Sweetwater's old 4A district for many years until the Mustangs dropped to 3A.
Sweetwater goes to Comanche for its 7-3A opener Oct. 13, then hosts Clyde Oct. 20 before facing Wylie. After a week off, the Mustangs host Breckenridge Nov. 10 to end the season.
Breckenridge - yet another tradition-rich school - was an 8-4 playoff team in 2005 and Comanche made it to the bi-district round. Clyde was just 3-7, but gave Sweetwater a tough game in district as the Bulldogs lost just 20-13.
“People will have to understand that all of the folks on our schedule are capable of winning at any time,” Jackson said. “It will be a playoff level atmosphere from the beginning, but we will be stronger for it. Staying healthy will be a huge deal. There are a lot of intangibles that we won't know until we get started. But every group we've had has found a way to step up to the challenge and I feel like this group will, too.”
Jackson, who has a 52-15 record and has led the Mustangs to playoff appearances in each of his five seasons since becoming head coach here, is well aware that Sweetwater's scheduling problem is no accident.
“When you have had the suc-cess we've had, folks find other teams to play,” he said. “But the thing about it is that playing them will make you better. We look forward to getting after it.
“We won't ever be able to get out of the day-to-day mentality. We've got to find a way to keep getting better each game. It will be a challenging deal, but also rewarding if we approach it the right way. We've got to be prepared for what we know will be an extremely tough district.”
Offense
While more and more high school teams are throwing the ball a lot these days, don't ex-pect a big change at Sweetwa-ter. Not when you have three returning running backs who gained just over 3,000 yards.
Seniors Joseph Banyard and Skye Green give Sweetwater one of its most potent 1-2 backfield tandems ever. In 2005, Banyard (181) rushed for 1,288 yards and 23 touchdowns while Green (148), who was the Class 3A bronze medalist in the 100 dash, had 1,241 yards and 22 TDs. The two all-state speedsters also each caught 10 passes. Junior fullback Auston Da-vis (184) also returns after gaining 558 yards and earning first team all-district honors.
Also getting playing time will be J.J. McCoy (127), Maurice Rosas (169), Rufus McCann (185), Justin Rodriguez (151) and Martin Williams (156).
Assuming the fulltime quar-terback duties is senior Duone Cunnings (175), who saw considerable action at the position a year ago until a serious collarbone injury knocked him out for several weeks. Thomas Hol-sey (149), up from the JV team, will also get playing time.
There are plenty of holes to fill on the offensive line, which was wiped out by graduation, and some new faces at receiver as well.
James Beckwith (257) will move from tackle to center and Brandon Bugarin (269) will be at right guard, with Max May (172) or Jeffery Straley (175) at left guard. Fighting it out to start at left tackle will be Shane Rains (270), Eric Hernandez (248) and Chris Ramirez (314). Chase Strother (268) will con-tend with Ramirez to start at right tackle, while brothers Ad-am Salazar (208) and Frankie Salazar (274) will compete to start at center and right guard, respectively. The tight end will be Justin Adames (190), with Keifer Adamez (174), Rico Gar-za (199) and David Covington (180) also seeing action.
The receiving candidates are Bryan Boyd (150), Logan Glass (160), Travis Wallace (146), Lundi Cotten (126) and Cory Fergeson (150).
Defense
Sweetwater has quite a few returning players who started at least a handful of games on defense this past season. The most prominent are Adames at middle linebacker, McCann at strongside linebacker, Rodri-guez at cornerback and Bugar-in at tackle, as all four earned all-district recognition in 2005.
Adames, who also earned all-state honors, led the team with 161 tackles and McCann - the district's top defensive newco-mer - recorded 116. Another returning starter is Banyard, an all-district linebacker who was moved to strong safety. Davis is expected to be the starting weakside linebacker with Wil-liams, Covington and Rosas also seeing action. McCoy, Green and Anthony Hunter (128) will compete to start at the other cornerback spot while Wallace, Glass and Cotten will also get time. Banyard will contend with Boyd and Fergeson at strong safety, and Holsey, Cun-nings and Colton Burton (150) are the free safety candidates.
Bugarin will be backed by Rains and Ramirez at one tack-le, while Beckwith, Hernandez and both Salazars are compe-ting at the other tackle spot. Straley, May and Garza will vie for one of the end positions, and Adamez and Strother are competing on the other side.
Kicking, special teams
Either McCann, last year's starter, or Cunnings is expected to handle the punting duties in 2006. Beckwith handled kickoffs a year ago and will contend with Banyard for those duties, and either Beckwith or Banyard will be the new extra point and field goal kicker. Glass is expec-ted to be the deep snapper and Boyd will be the holder.
The candidates to handle the kick returns are McCoy, Ban-yard, Green, Cunnings, Rodri-guez and Holsey.
Changes may be coming for the 2006 Sweet-water football team when it plays its new sched-ule this fall, but the winning is likely to continue.
That's because the Mustangs should be explosive again on offense - they return a pair of 1,000-yard rushers - and they have a lot of returning talent on defense as well. Sweetwater will need all that talent to compete well in its new 7-3A district, which retains Wylie and Clyde and adds Breckenridge and Comanche.
Sweetwater plays at Wylie - which has handed the Mustangs their only district loss each of the past two years - on Oct. 27. Both teams are state-ranked by Texas Football with Sweetwater No. 12 and Wylie is No. 18, according to the pub-lication, which ranks the top 25.
The Mustangs and Bulldogs have also shared 4-3A district honors with Snyder (now in District 3-3A) the past two years, and they were a combined 23-5 in 2005 with Sweetwater (13-2) making the Division II semifinals and Wylie (10-3) going to the Division I quarterfinals.
But forgive head coach Kent Jackson for not concentrating on Wylie. He must worry about a Murderer's Row non-district schedule that could make it tough for the Mustangs to match last season's 13 wins, which equalled a school record.
Sweetwater begins this season Sept. 1 at Class 4A Wichita Falls, a tradition-rich program which was 6-4 a year ago. The Mustangs will then face an even more tradition-rich Class 4A school - Brownwood - a week later when they host their second annual Sammy Baugh Classic.
After that, Sweetwater plays three consecutive road games starting with a trip to Brownwood's Gordon Wood Stadium on Sept. 14, where the Mustangs have a Thursday night game against Decatur at the Gordon Wood Classic. After that, Sweetwater has road contests at Canyon and Big Spring before finally returning home Oct. 6 to play Borger in its last non-district game.
Brownwood, Decatur, Canyon and Big Spring all made the playoffs in 2005, while Borger and Wichita Falls missed but still had identical win-ning records of 6-4.
Canyon was a 10-2 regional semifinalist last year, losing 39-36 to Wylie in the second round. The Eagles and Borger are picked by Texas Football to finish 1-2 in District 5-3A. Big Spring, of course, was in Sweetwater's old 4A district for many years until the Mustangs dropped to 3A.
Sweetwater goes to Comanche for its 7-3A opener Oct. 13, then hosts Clyde Oct. 20 before facing Wylie. After a week off, the Mustangs host Breckenridge Nov. 10 to end the season.
Breckenridge - yet another tradition-rich school - was an 8-4 playoff team in 2005 and Comanche made it to the bi-district round. Clyde was just 3-7, but gave Sweetwater a tough game in district as the Bulldogs lost just 20-13.
“People will have to understand that all of the folks on our schedule are capable of winning at any time,” Jackson said. “It will be a playoff level atmosphere from the beginning, but we will be stronger for it. Staying healthy will be a huge deal. There are a lot of intangibles that we won't know until we get started. But every group we've had has found a way to step up to the challenge and I feel like this group will, too.”
Jackson, who has a 52-15 record and has led the Mustangs to playoff appearances in each of his five seasons since becoming head coach here, is well aware that Sweetwater's scheduling problem is no accident.
“When you have had the suc-cess we've had, folks find other teams to play,” he said. “But the thing about it is that playing them will make you better. We look forward to getting after it.
“We won't ever be able to get out of the day-to-day mentality. We've got to find a way to keep getting better each game. It will be a challenging deal, but also rewarding if we approach it the right way. We've got to be prepared for what we know will be an extremely tough district.”
Offense
While more and more high school teams are throwing the ball a lot these days, don't ex-pect a big change at Sweetwa-ter. Not when you have three returning running backs who gained just over 3,000 yards.
Seniors Joseph Banyard and Skye Green give Sweetwater one of its most potent 1-2 backfield tandems ever. In 2005, Banyard (181) rushed for 1,288 yards and 23 touchdowns while Green (148), who was the Class 3A bronze medalist in the 100 dash, had 1,241 yards and 22 TDs. The two all-state speedsters also each caught 10 passes. Junior fullback Auston Da-vis (184) also returns after gaining 558 yards and earning first team all-district honors.
Also getting playing time will be J.J. McCoy (127), Maurice Rosas (169), Rufus McCann (185), Justin Rodriguez (151) and Martin Williams (156).
Assuming the fulltime quar-terback duties is senior Duone Cunnings (175), who saw considerable action at the position a year ago until a serious collarbone injury knocked him out for several weeks. Thomas Hol-sey (149), up from the JV team, will also get playing time.
There are plenty of holes to fill on the offensive line, which was wiped out by graduation, and some new faces at receiver as well.
James Beckwith (257) will move from tackle to center and Brandon Bugarin (269) will be at right guard, with Max May (172) or Jeffery Straley (175) at left guard. Fighting it out to start at left tackle will be Shane Rains (270), Eric Hernandez (248) and Chris Ramirez (314). Chase Strother (268) will con-tend with Ramirez to start at right tackle, while brothers Ad-am Salazar (208) and Frankie Salazar (274) will compete to start at center and right guard, respectively. The tight end will be Justin Adames (190), with Keifer Adamez (174), Rico Gar-za (199) and David Covington (180) also seeing action.
The receiving candidates are Bryan Boyd (150), Logan Glass (160), Travis Wallace (146), Lundi Cotten (126) and Cory Fergeson (150).
Defense
Sweetwater has quite a few returning players who started at least a handful of games on defense this past season. The most prominent are Adames at middle linebacker, McCann at strongside linebacker, Rodri-guez at cornerback and Bugar-in at tackle, as all four earned all-district recognition in 2005.
Adames, who also earned all-state honors, led the team with 161 tackles and McCann - the district's top defensive newco-mer - recorded 116. Another returning starter is Banyard, an all-district linebacker who was moved to strong safety. Davis is expected to be the starting weakside linebacker with Wil-liams, Covington and Rosas also seeing action. McCoy, Green and Anthony Hunter (128) will compete to start at the other cornerback spot while Wallace, Glass and Cotten will also get time. Banyard will contend with Boyd and Fergeson at strong safety, and Holsey, Cun-nings and Colton Burton (150) are the free safety candidates.
Bugarin will be backed by Rains and Ramirez at one tack-le, while Beckwith, Hernandez and both Salazars are compe-ting at the other tackle spot. Straley, May and Garza will vie for one of the end positions, and Adamez and Strother are competing on the other side.
Kicking, special teams
Either McCann, last year's starter, or Cunnings is expected to handle the punting duties in 2006. Beckwith handled kickoffs a year ago and will contend with Banyard for those duties, and either Beckwith or Banyard will be the new extra point and field goal kicker. Glass is expec-ted to be the deep snapper and Boyd will be the holder.
The candidates to handle the kick returns are McCoy, Ban-yard, Green, Cunnings, Rodri-guez and Holsey.