-
Two Wortham defenders combine to bring down a Normangee ball carrier during a scrimmage Thursday. Wortham will travel to Itasca Friday night for a 7:30 game to begin the regular-season. Photo by Jennifer Lansford/For The Mexia News
Wortham’s first football game of the season against Itasca will be a slugfest up front of teams with large, physical offensive and defensive lines.
Whoever comes out on top in that battle will likely be the team that wins the game.
Wortham travels to Itasca for a 7:30 p.m. game Friday to begin the season.
Wortham coach Chad Coker said Itasca scrimmaged DeLeon last week and stopped up their opponent’s running attack.
“DeLeon struggled to move the ball. They run a slot-T and Itasca was so big up front they couldn’t really move them,” Coker said.
Wortham also is pretty big on the offensive line. The Bulldogs average 270 pounds and are led by 6-foot-3, 325-pound tackle Jake McClellan. They also return starters Jason Evans (5-10, 260) and Hayden Chaney (6-1, 250) at the guard spots.
Like last year, when they qualified for the playoffs, the Bulldogs will employ a power-running game.
“We’re going to pound on them to wear them out, hit them with our power counters inside, run sweeps outside to try to make those people run,” Coker said. “They don’t have a whole lot of depth. They have 22 out right now. We need to do like what we did last year, pound on them, wear them down, keep making them play defense. We feel like up front we’re just going to have to prove we can move those people out.”
Wortham’s main runner will be sophomore Tanner Bean, who gained more than 400 yards in a platoon situation last year. He could be lined up at quarterback on some plays and lined up at running back on others.
Bean and fellow sophomore Ryken Lewis, who was the backup quarterback last year, have been battling for the signal-caller job. Coker said either one could be the quarterback on any given play.
“We’re still going to keep them guessing,” he said. “We’re still working them both. Both did well in the scrimmage. There will be some packages where we want Tanner to be the quarterback and some packages where we need Ryken to be the quarterback.”
On offense, Itasca will try to spread the field. And with a lot of players going both ways, that big defensive line turns into a big offensive line.
“They have some big boys across the offensive line and the defensive line. That’s the biggest strength they have, how big they are,” Coker said.
Coker said Itasca also will line up in odd formations.
“They also run formations you may not use all the time,” he said. “The main thing for us is we’ve got to make sure we’re lining up right and not outflanked anywhere.”