Published: August 29, 2006 12:14 pm            

POJO defense looking to be sharp and effective

Teams will be feeling porcupine quills this season as they face the 2006 Springtown defense, which features athletes with size and a toughness that cannot be described.

“I don’t mess a whole lot with the defense and having a defensive coordinator that I trust and know, I just know they are going to get the job done,” said Springtown head football coach Brad Turner. “They keep me informed on what they are doing. Scott Wells knows how to defend just about anything out there. So first and foremost, having a guy that I trust and know is good.

“The 3-4 defense, in this day and time, with all the spread teams, it is so easily adjusted to just anything you see. In the old days, when you ran an eight-man front, what are you going to do when you get four, five wides? You cannot really adjust to it. We can really adjust to anything with the personnel we have on the field, whether it be two-back, tight end or whether it be five wides. It is very similar to Abilene High and Abilene Wylie.”

Turner said Wells has experience with the 3-4 defense from his time in both Abilene and at Texas A&M during the R.C. Slocum regime. Wells was a strength coach.

“[The 3-4 defense] is good for us,” Turner said. “I think, your defensive linemen, the nose guard and our two tackles, they are probably the heart of the defense. Then, if you have those guys, then having the linebackers that can run and safeties have to be good athletes, and we have got a great safety who is only a junior.”

The junior Turner is referring to is Al Owens, who was timed at the Kansas State football camp this summer as running a 4.4 40 while standing 6-2 and 180 pounds.

“Our safeties are very involved in our run game and coming up and making plays up or near the line,” Turner said. “Our biggest question mark, defensively, is finding some inside linebackers. But those kids are coming on and doing a good job.”

Some teams run a 3-4 defense and use the two outside linebackers as defensive ends, creating a five-man front with the two inside linebackers free to make plays at the line of scrimmage. Springtown is not one of those teams.

“The outside linebackers are basically defensive backs,” Turner said. “They run really good. Those defensive linemen’s jobs are to spill everything to the safeties and the outside backers. The way we line those guys up, there is not a lot of running room inside. We usually run a lot of under techniques with those guys and they try to spill everything to the backers. Those backers have to be able to force the run, cover the flat, cover man; there is a lot thrown on those outside backers.

“Thomas Gibson, who is a converted inside backer, is big and tall. On the other side, we have a couple kids fighting for the job.”

For everything to spill to the outside, senior Cameron Hoffman and juniors Aaron Bauman and Ty Burnett will have to use their size and long reach to make that happen.

“Hoffman, our nose guard, is about 240, 250,” Turner said. “Our two defensive tackles are both juniors and they are book ends. [Bauman and Burtnett] look very similar, they are 6-2 or 6-3 and 220. Not real heavy, but they run sub-5.0 40s and have long arms. They are perfect for what I consider high school 3-4 defensive ends.”

At cornerback, Turner is not looking for prototypes. He is looking for results.

“Everybody wants to have big, tall, fast corners, but for me, they have to have a knack for making plays,” Turner said. “I have had little ones, big ones, short ones, tall ones. If you can make plays out there, you are hired.”

The one thing Turner continued to compliment his team about was their toughness, especially of the guys on defense.

“It is vital,” Turner said.

There are several players who exhibit the meaning of hard work, determination, and sacrifice, like senior outside linebacker Chip Lynn for example.

“Chip Lynn, who is one of the strongest leaders of the defense, is playing with a completely torn ACL. It kind of teaches you the mentality of some of these kids. He is an old school, country boy. We got new DNA helmets. He did not want any part of that. He just wanted a regular, old helmet with a Bill Bates face mask. He did not want any Underarmor. He wanted a gray T-shirt. He is a good kid. He gets after it.

“That mentality permeates the defensive unit. He came in here and said, ‘They want me to have it operated on and I don’t want to.’ I said, ‘Well I had one play at Sulpher Springs, a running back who played like that for 11 games. It can be done.’ And he said, ‘That is what I am going to do. I am not going to get it cut until we are done.’ Things like that — some of these others will appreciate what they have got a little more. All [Lynn] wanted to do was be a starter and play. It nearly got taken away from him, and he just chose to not let it happen.”

Senior defensive back Danny Hill is another player who has gone through much to get where he is.

“His summer job and his spring job last semester I was here, was repossessing cars,” Turner said. “He would work all night, and then he would be at school in the morning. He would only get paid for the cars he repossessed. He has probably been through more in his life than I have my entire life. For him to be the kid he is and have the respect for the coaches and his teammates, that says wonders about his character. The kids respect him. Some are afraid of him. But he is a great player.

“Our other outside linebacker, Thomas Gibson, I was driving down Main St. during the summer and I see him on a tractor with a load of hay behind him. He had been hauling hay all day and was fixing to come to summer work-out.

“As a coach, a kid that will get up, haul hay, drive a tractor and do that all day then make summer work-out, or a kid that will repossess cars all night then make it to school in the next morning, or a kid that wants to play his entire season on a torn ACL...there are many others with similar stories,” Turner said. “When you have kids like that, then how can you not be successful, in spite of outside circumstances.”

        

• Click to discuss this story with other readers on our forums.