There are just 30 days remaining until the kickoff of the 2023 high school football season. But make no mistake, preparations for the upcoming campaign got underway months ago. And teams throughout northeast Georgia already are in full countdown mode.
With that in mind, we spent the last couple of weeks catching up with programs around our area to get a feel for how spring practice went, how the summer is going, and what coaches believe the fall will look like. Our "Two-a-Days" series honors those old-school grinding sessions that lead us out of summer and into fall, asking each area coach two key questions about the state of their respective programs.
Over the next two weeks, AccessWDUN's Friday Game Night will get you prepped for the start of gridiron action with responses from coaches throughout northeast Georgia.
(Teams run in alphabetical order)...
EAST HALL
The Vikings suffered a slew of injuries that contributed to a 2-8 overall record and 0-8 in Region 8-4A play in 2022. But head coach Matt Turner is hoping the game experience that his younger players got will now begin to pay off.
They have the makings for an explosive offense with a two-headed quarterback situation and tons of skilled players. The defense, which has been an issue for several years, made improvement in 2022 despite the record.
We asked Turner how the quarterback battle between Jamarcus Harrison and Peyton Llewallyn was shaping up and how a rebuild along the defensive line was coming along as well.
QUESTION: The offense, which was ravaged by injuries last year, definitely will need to be more productive in 2023. How is the development of QBs Jamarcus Harrison and Peyton Llewallyn coming along and what have you seen from the offense so far in the summer?
A: We have seen tremendous strides in our offense production through the spring and summer. Last year, we knew that we were going to go through some growing pains on offense with both of our QBs being so young and lacking valuable experience. However, we have seen them grow tremendously since last year and we are expecting them to make big strides this year with running the offense. You can see that they have a much better understanding of the system, what we are trying to do, and that the speed of the game has slowed down for them. We’re very excited about the growth we have seen from our QBs and our offense as a whole.
Q: The defense made big strides in 2022. You have a talented core group returning. But you are having to rework the defensive line. Who has started to emerge up front in the summer?
A: We definitely made some strides on defense last year. However, we still have a long way to go. But a lot of that had to do with our defensive line. The challenge for us this year is having to replace several key guys that played on the defensive line last year. However, we feel that we have several guys that can fill those gaps and be very good players for us. Both Jacob Hernandez and Aaron Brock have really emerged since the spring and we’re expecting both of them to be very solid for us. Also, Chasen Jones has the ability to really get after the QB and live in the opponent’s backfield. Also, Jayce Poole is another guy who has really came on since the spring as well. And the biggest surprise has been the emergence of Delsin Grindle. Delsin missed all of last season with an injury but he has been very solid and has performed very well in summer competitions.
- Up Next in Two-a-Days: EAST JACKSON
- Previous Two-a-Days: EAST FORSYTH
