Football: Offense or Defense – Prep Players Bring it on Either Side of the Line

Flintridge Prep football coach Antonio Harrison has big plans for sophomore Stefan Smith as the team starts its summer practices. Harrison wants Smith to be one of his starting linebackers in his 4-4 defensive scheme in the fall.

With losing its top two tacklers to graduation, Smith will be expected to fill a big role on the defensive side of the ball.

If that weren’t enough to ask of the sophomore, Harrison wants Smith to compete for the starting quarterback job and run the team’s modified wing-t offense.

If Smith doesn’t win the quarterback job over the summer, Harrison said he wants him to be part of the offense, perhaps as a receiver.

“He’s too good of an athlete not to have on the field,” Harrison said.

Smith and junior Clayton Werick will compete for the starting quarterback position over summer. Whichever player wins the job will have to be able to handle a huge learning curve. Werick is a little more familiar with the system coming from running the offense on the junior varsity team last year.

Flintridge Prep will be looking to improve on its 2-6-1 record from a year ago. The two wins for Flintridge Prep came against Prep League opponents, an encouraging note for Harrison. Another strength Harrison sees on his team is the depth of the offensive line.

Coaching a small-school program like Flintridge Prep makes it a challenge to find players big enough to play on the offensive and defensive lines, Harrison said. But this year is different. Harrison said he has offensive linemen who are quick enough and athletic enough to run the wing-t. He said he’s loaded at the line position and has them working with some of the skill players to improve their speed.

Eric Kazangian led Flintridge Prep with 83 tackles last year. Jordan Whaley was second on the team with 76 tackles and tops on the team with three interceptions. Both graduated in the spring.

Harrison is depending on some newcomers to fill the void left by Kazangian and Whaley. Senior Daniel Jung and junior Dylan Caulifower will have their chances to move into starting linebacker roles over the summer. Senior Lucas Kim, who was injured for most of the 2010 season, is expected to be the leader of the defensive unit.

Another promising returning player is Chris Wirthlin. The senior led the team in rushing last year with 490 yards and three touchdowns. He averaged 6.5 yards per carry. He will get the bulk of the carries over the summer at running back.

His presence might be felt more on defense. He had three interceptions and is described as the team’s “shut-down corner” by Harrison. He said opposing teams only threw to the receivers he was covering 15 times last year. Three of those times, Wirthlin picked off the pass.

“He will be our running back to start off with,” Harrison said. “He might be one of our smallest guys, but he has the heart of a lion.”

Harrison said he is going to limit the number of passing tournaments he enters his team in over the summer. He only has two on his schedule. Both are at San Gabriel High School with the first on Tuesday. The next one is July 21.

Harrison will be scrimmaging more over the summer to prepare his team for the start of the football seaosn in August. He plans on working with Malibu, Duarte and Arcadia, among others, over the summer.