Crouching Tigers Begin Early Season With Friday Scrimmage

Kevin Callahan watches practice every day and has a good idea of the condition of his Ridgefield Tigers. What the coach doesn’t know yet is how good they’ll be and if they’ll better last fall’s 7-3 record.

"We train pretty hard in the summer,’’ Callahan said Thursday afternoon. "We are fit.’’

The Tigers’ coach since 1999, Callahan and his staff are seeing the days quickly pass as the Sept. 16 season opener at Greenwich approaches. It’s a little less than a month away, but the clock ticks and there are no timeouts.

"Our offense and defense are practically all installed,’’ Callahan said, "but we aren’t ready for the start of the season. We still have a lot of work to do and a lot to learn.’’

A big chunk of that work will take place 5 p.m. Friday at the high school in a scrimmage against Joel Barlow High School of Redding. It will be the first of four scrimmages for the Tigers, and Callahan’s staff is in full teaching -- and learning -- mode.

Callahan knows who’ll get a lot of playing time but hasn’t yet formulated his depth chart. In an ideal situation, he’d like to have a set defense and offense, but he knows he’ll have players going on both sides of the ball.

"We want to play as many kids as we can and get an evaluation of where we are,’’ Callahan said. "We want to see how well we’re settling in with our offense and defense.

"Nothing that happens will make or break what decisions we have to make as far as who starts," the coach said. "If a player doesn’t do well that won’t mean he’s not going to play.’’

In short, the depth chart won’t be named after the scrimmage.

Mistakes will be made, but Callahan is especially interested in the exchanges between the center and new quarterback Connor Rowe, as well as his running backs. He’s also keenly interested in offsides penalties.

Both reflect timing.

Rowe, a junior, started the last three games of the 2010 season. Callahan said that’s a springboard from which to work, but a small sampling nonetheless.

"He’s an all-time football player,’’ Callahan said. "He trains all year round.’’

Callahan saw Rowe’s potential at the end of last year and moved then-quarterback Griffin McCarty to receiver to give Rowe the snaps, getting him acclimated to the position.

But it's one thing that Rowe studies his game tapes, runs and lifts weights -- football is a timing sport, and now he's working with his receivers on patterns and the blocking schemes with his offensive line.

As this time, Rowe’s primary target is the six-foot-four receiver Jack Heller. Jack Turner, Sam Gravitte and Will Bonaparte figure to be the primary running backs.

Callahan wants Rowe to spread the ball around with a controlled passing game, but he said his passer has the arm to air it out. Of course, when a passer has to throw it deep on a consistent basis, that’s not a good sign.

A new quarterback will have growing pains, but so will a new defense, and this fall Callahan plans to go with a 3-4 alignment.

"We're changing our front because that plays well to our athletes,’’ Callahan said. "We don’t have a lot of big kids up front.’’

Pressure on the opposing quarterback will come primarily from Turner, who also plays linebacker, as well as Chris Mirra and Adrian Jones.

The Barlow scrimmage is for learning, and Callahan said there’s only one certainty in its outcome.

"We’ll be looking at a lot of film,’’ he said.