South Lakes Seahawks Armed with Athleticism

New South Lakes football head coach Andy Hill has no illusions about the daunting task in front of him. To turn around a team that hasn't had a winning record since 2002, he must change the culture surrounding the Seahawks.

"What we really started talking about was accountability," Hill said. "If we want to get a different result, we have to do things different than we have in the past. That started with our offseason."

Hill brought a fresh mentality to South Lakes this summer. Relative to the rest of the teams in the VHSL AAA Northern Region, the Seahawks lack size. To compensate for that, Hill insists that his team needs to be the best conditioned.

"Any time you look at a good program, it's the little things," Hill said. "The way they talk about their workouts, the way they view conditioning as a tool to get better rather than a punishment to endure at the end of practice.

"If you look back at last year's game film, [these guys] were in a position to go 7-3 or 8-2 but they lost a few games late. We have to be in excellent physical condition."

To take advantage of their improved stamina, South Lakes now runs a spread option, no-huddle offense. By forgoing a huddle between plays, Hill hopes the Seahawks can victimize opponents who may not be able to keep up with their pace. Spreading it out wide should enable them to use their speed and athleticism, and get their skill players the ball with some space to operate.

"This year we have more speed, " said senior running back Ja'Juan Jones. "The spread offense allows us to take advantage of one-on-one situations."

Under former coach John Ellenberger, the Seahawks ran a Wing-T, which is based on ball control and running the football. In the spread option, South Lakes will inevitably throw the ball far more than it did in the past. It's a change senior wide receiver and free safety Sean Price feels fits the team's personnel.

"There are more options because our team is so athletic, we can pass and run with the same people," Price said. "Last year we had the same athletes, but they were so limited in the backfield. Now that we're out in the open, we can throw it everywhere and we can run it everywhere."

Even though the sheer athleticism is there from top to bottom, there's still a learning curve. The spread calls for the Seahawks' receivers to run more complex routes than they have the last few seasons. Also, with more frequent stretches and sweeps, there's more pressure on the wideouts to get good downfield blocks.

Thus far this offseason, wide receivers coach Andre Allen is very pleased with what he has seen out of his guys.

"I think they're adapting to the spread pretty well," Allen said. "They're getting the plays down, getting our formations down and starting to understand the concepts of our plays. Once they get that down to a tee, we should be good to go."

The Seahawks employ more two-way players than the average team, another strategy aimed at capitalizing on their athleticism. In addition to Price, senior wide receiver and cornerback Darius Smith and senior quarterback and linebacker Mike Bissonnette start on both sides of the ball.

While the Seahawks have their eyes focused on their first winning season in nearly a decade, Hill stresses it's not all about winning and losing. At the end of the day, he wants his players to have ownership of the team.

"The thing that's going to help us have a winning season is when we realize it's us, that we're going to put our name on it, that we're going to have no excuses," Hill said emphatically. "We need to say, 'This is our season, and we're going to sign our name to the bottom of it when it's done.'"

In addition to a signature, the Seahawks are confident that bottom line will also have more wins than losses.