Top talent for 7-on-7

From Searcy, Ark., to North Augusta, S.C., and Neptune Beach, Fla., to Bowling Green, Ky., you can find at least as many reasons why coaches are looking forward to The Daily Citizen’s second annual Southeastern 7-on-7 Championship as there are teams and talented players in the 32-school, seven-state tournament.

But among each of those teams, the shared understanding is that they will leave Dalton better for having been a part of the two-day test featuring some of the South’s best high school football programs. The tournament begins at noon Saturday and will finish Sunday, with games played at the Dalton Parks and Recreation Department’s James Brown Park, Durkan Soccer Complex and Gaston Community Center.

And that’s true whether they’re sleeping in their beds — in the case of five schools from within Whitfield County — or crossing several state borders to get here.

Before the weekly routine of fall arrives, with a new opponent and game plan every seven days, summer presents a grand opportunity for teams to turn their focus inward and make themselves the best they can be. But the rise of seven-on-seven football over the past two decades has helped give coaches and players a way to see how they’re doing long before preseason scrimmages arrive.

While seven-on-seven football, which lacks linemen and contact, may not be a perfect duplication of the crisp fall game, it’s certainly a useful indicator with the mercury at its peak.

Kevin Rose, the coach of Bob Jones of Madison, Ala. — last year’s Southeastern 7-on-7 champion — will tell you that.

“It’s a great way to cause your passing offense and passing defense to be judged in a competitive environment,” he said. “We do exactly what we do (during the high school season) in seven-on-seven.”

LaFayette, which is making one of the shortest trips among schools outside the immediate area traveling from just over the ridge from Walker County, may not have enjoyed the same level of success that Bob Jones did at last year’s tournament.

The Ramblers, though competitive in almost every game, went just 1-3 in pool play.

But veteran coach Tab Gable knows his team was getting the same kind of benefits as those who moved on from pool play — maybe even more so as the Ramblers were forced to push themselves to new heights.

“This is kind of the cream of the crop by far,” Gable said. “There were no negatives. It was a great experience. It was good for our team to see other teams and the athletes they have and the level they were at.”

George Washington Carver coach Billy Gresham is glad to make the trip from Montgomery, Ala., because his team enjoys seven-on-seven games and he enjoys seeing his players’ competitive side making an appearance this far out from the regular season.

“How guys perform in seven-on-seven can give you a good idea how they may play in real games,” Gresham said. “We can see how they throw the ball, catch the ball, defend the ball in tough situations. These things are gauges for coaches in determining how guys can play at a high level against great teams.”

While some teams may place more emphasis than others on actually winning games at the Southeastern, coaches for every school will be watching the individual battles to learn whom they may able to count on when kickoff comes later this summer.

While some teams will come to Dalton expecting to polish their first-team offense or defense, there are plenty who will make the two-day event a crucible of sorts in the search for starters.

Southeast Whitfield coach Sean Gray is preparing for his first season leading the Raiders, and he expects the tournament to help him learn a little more about his potential lineup.

“I’m looking more to the defensive work we’re going to get more than the offense,” Gray said. “I’m looking more to make sure my kids understand the zones and man-to-man that we get. These types of competitions definitely give us a good idea of who we’re going to have as starting receivers, cornerbacks and even quarterbacks once training camp starts.”

Gray’s outlook reveals one shared by many coaches. While fans may envision quarterbacks slinging the football downfield and receivers leaping for those passes in seven-on-seven games — and there will definitely be some of that going on in Dalton — lots of coaches deal in the equal-and-opposite reaction business.

They know that being forced to pass means being forced to defend the pass, and that’s good preparation for what’s to come this fall, too. As more and more teams look to wide-open spread offenses, hoping for the best or simply dodging teams that thrive on throwing is not a realistic option — if it ever was.

“Some people think it’s for the offense,” Pierce County coach Sean Pender said, “but I really like it for the looks that the defense gets. They get to see different sets that you don’t normally play against. Offensively, it’s good for timing your quarterback.”

Again, while there will be plenty of teams whose seven-on-seven style isn’t too far from their throw-first approach in the fall, there will be lots in Dalton who count the running game as their best option. But the coaches of those teams know being forced to pass now is good training for the time when the situation dictates moving through the air — quickly.

Might as well get the passing jitters out of the way when your regular-season record, place in the league standings or push for the state playoffs are not in danger.

“It’s all about reps and timing,” Stone Mountain coach Dante Ferguson said. “If our guys continue to get those reps, they’ll become more confident. We went against Martin Luther King in our first passing league matchup and it seemed like we were a step behind, and to me that was just a lack of confidence.

“In our second week, we showed remarkable improvement against Grayson and Eastside out of Covington. The seven-on-seven games really help you. We need that competition to work on routes and timing.”

Ferguson and the Pirates aren’t alone in regular competition in weekly passing leagues during the summer. But while those competitions against nearby schools have some value, bringing together programs from seven states increases the chances of seeing something different.

That’s one reason Fletcher coach Josh Corey is bringing his bunch all the way from Neptune Beach, Fla. The Senators’ trip rates among the longest for this year’s Southeastern teams — the school is just outside Jacksonville — but he knows it won’t be without justification.

“Sometimes you stay in Florida and you see the same guys over and over again, so this was kind of a refreshing change,” Corey said. “This was good to see so many teams from out of state. We want to go and get some good work against quality teams, but this is also like a reward for our kids, to take them out of state.”

What every team will no doubt get is plenty of football. Last year’s inaugural tournament featured 20 teams in pool competition for four spots in the semifinals, meaning four teams from each pool were eliminated after the opening day.

Organizers took note of the desire for all teams to play both days; as a result, they were determined to maximize the on-field time when the tournament expanded in its return this year. Now, every team will play the second day, either advancing to the championship or consolation bracket.

That’s probably very good news to coach Kevin Wallace, whose Purples are making the ride from Bowling Green, Ky., not so much with championship hopes as hopes for a challenge.

“Our goal is not to come to Dalton to win the seven-on-seven, but to get more experience by going through it. We want to come out to see really good competition and get pushed to improve.”

With two days of action, that shouldn’t be a problem for anyone.

And while seven-on-seven may not look exactly like what your team will do a couple months from now, it may be more kin than you think.

In the past, Griffin coach Sean DeVoursney was slow to warm to the idea of passing competitions, particularly when his Bears were a run-heavy wing-T team. He no longer needs convincing, and the school now hosts its own tournament each summer.

“After going to some of them, I saw how much better you can get,” he said. “One year we got to the playoffs and called a play we hadn’t run all season, but had used in some seven-on-sevens. We ran two verticals to the inside guys and ran the fullback down the middle of the field and hit him.

“It worked.”

— Reporting by Lindsey Derrick, Larry Fleming, Devin Golden, Erik Green, Doug Hawley and Chris Whitfield.

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