After three months of his gamers understanding from dwelling, Ninety Six soccer coach Matthew Owings has been impressed with what he’s seen in his crew’s return to the sector.
Final week marked the beginning of Ninety Six’s spring exercises underneath Part 1 of the South Carolina Excessive Faculty League tips. Owings and his teaching workers have welcomed small teams of gamers onto the sector for coaching, beginning final Tuesday.
“We’re doing what we’ve received to do, and I believed final week went fairly clean,” Owings stated. “For us being off for 3 months, I used to be actually happy with final week.”
Together with understanding at a distance, the summer season warmth proved to be one other problem for the Wildcats on Monday. Owings and his workers adjusted some exercises and added extra break occasions.
“As everyone knows, final week was fairly cool,” Owings stated. “The climate helped us out lots — reward the Lord — however we’ll see how this week goes. Hopefully, extra of the identical from final week. Nonetheless, it’s no completely different than once we begin a season and undergo warmth acclimation.”
Conditioning has been the principle focus throughout exercises. The crew has included weight coaching and velocity and agility workouts into the Part 1 exercises. The SCHSL’s Part 1 tips stipulate that groups can not use shared sports activities tools, which incorporates footballs.
Ninety Six has had round 35 gamers take part in every exercise, which is a rise from final 12 months’s numbers when Owings was getting ready to enter his first season on the helm.
“My first week right here after being employed, we really didn’t have this many, so I’m happy from that perspective,” Owings stated. “We wish the numbers to extend extra, and I’m positive they are going to.”
The crew has welcomed a number of newcomers to the roster, which has made it a problem to construct chemistry with gamers cut up into staggered teams.
“It’s been onerous since you wish to join with everyone, not only one group,” rising senior offensive lineman Jordan Wright stated. “At Ninety Six, we love crew stuff and love being a household. You’ve simply received to regulate, and hopefully later within the season we’ll join with everyone.”
Crew competitors in apply will likely be prohibited throughout Part 1. Footballs or sports activities tools is not going to be allowed for the primary 10 days of exercises or 14 calendar days.
The SCHSL has but to launch its tips for subsequent phases. Within the meantime, Owings stated the one changes he plans to make throughout Part 1 is extending the size of exercises over time. Ninety Six plans to apply 4 occasions every week.
“After these first 4 days, I feel we’ve received a fairly good routine and have gotten used to it,” Owings stated. “As soon as we get began throwing the ball round, that’ll be good to get some extra football-specific actions.”
Contact sports activities author Wesley Dotson at 864-943-2530 or comply with him on Twitter @WesleyPDotson.