Coaches Corner: Lakes Football Head Coach Dave Miller

The Lakes football team has started the year with three dominating wins, outscoring opponents 169-21. The Lancers play their final non-conference game tonight against Wilson (0-3), before starting the difficult SPSL 3A schedule. Patch Sports Editor Mike Baldwin spoke with Lakes head coach Dave Miller on Thursday and got his thoughts on how the team has played so far and what he expects in the coming weeks.

Is there anything about this team that is standing out that maybe you did not expect?

No. Obviously we did not expect to . Capital’s a quality football team, they’ve proved it against Olympia and against O’Dea and I think our kids came out and absolutely were on fire and played really well and we were excited about that last week. The first two weeks we didn’t have a lot of competition, so we kind of figured it was going to be a short time there, but it’s pretty much business as usual. The kids have been playing well, getting better, working hard. I think the biggest challenge is coming out and being focused when you know you’re playing a team you’re probably going to beat.

Have you had any problems with players staying focused before games they are expected to win?

We haven’t had any problems with it this year. We have in the past, but this year it’s been a real focused group. The first three weeks they’ve been really dialed in and really, really focused. You kind of look for that fast start and we’ve gotten off to fast starts all three weeks.

One thing that has stood out about the way you guys have started is that some of the bigger names from last year have not had to put up big numbers in order to win. What’s it been like to have contributions from so many different players?

We just have a lot of experience and we have depth. We lost our starting center in week one, our backup center went out week two and so we’re down to our third center and our third center is playing just as well as the first two guys. I think having great depth has helped us and just having so much experience. A lot of these seniors have played in the [Tacoma] Dome three years in a row in the [semifinals of the state tournament] and I think these kids have just been through a lot and nothing fazes them. I’m also really pleased with the way we’re playing together as a team. Sometimes you worry about, when you have a lot of good players, not having enough balls to go around, but these kids are so unselfish. They’re not worried about how many touches they get or what kind of stats they get, they’re all about winning.

In terms of the quarterback position, what have you seen from David Wood during his first three games as a starter?

Well I think David has given us a really nice added dimension with his strong arm and his passing ability. The plan still is to use Cedric [Dozier] at quarterback as well. Cedric is a dynamic receiver and he’s showing some people that he can do some things at that position as well. We’ve just got to make sure we find a nice balance where David does what he does and Cedric can do what he does and get them both involved.

When was the last time you had a team that had such a strong passing game?

I think probably back to when we had Calvin Schmidtke, we had a pretty good balance in 2007. We’re always a team that’s trying to get balanced, but, in high school, you’ve got to do what you do best. If the running game is what you do best, then that’s what you go with and we’ve had years where all we could is throw it and we couldn’t run it. I think right now we’re hard to defend because we can do both. We’ve got five pretty good backs and then both our quarterbacks can run and hurt you too and then you’ve got four to six receivers that can hurt you at any time also. I think to defend us, you’ve got to really worry about a lot of weapons.

You’re about to wrap up your non-conference schedule. What have you seen from the teams you will be facing in the SPSL?

I think Peninsula has a really good team, probably one of the better teams they’ve had, so I expect a challenge next week out of them. Bonney Lake throws the ball really well so they’re always dangerous. And then, to be honest with you, we’re not sure what Enumclaw’s got yet, Auburn Mountanview and Decatur are kind of unknowns for us. But right now if you look at the top ten in the state, we’ve got three SPSL teams in there. I think that was the only league in the state that was represented with three teams, so it might be a pretty good league.

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