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Prep football preview 2017
Thursday, Aug. 31, 2017 • The Hays Daily News
Once again, Plainville faces ‘the gauntlet’ By NICK SCHWIEN nschwien@dailynews.net
NICK SCHWIEN, nschwien@dailynews.net
TMP senior running back Gavin Schumacher had a solid season last year and is looking to improve on that performance this season.
Schumacher runs into 2017 By NICK SCHWIEN nschwien@dailynews.net
maybe as much as Alex Patel — but he’s right there working out with him. He’s not taking the weight off when he’s working out with him. And he’s fast, he’s It might be easy to overlook a small runner in the strong, and he can catch out of the backfield. He’s an backfield. all-around player.” At only 5-foot-7 and weighing nearly 170 pounds, Patel and the offensive line’s play can only help Gavin Schumacher fits that role. Schumacher stand out this fall. But this year, the Thomas More Prep-Marian “The line needs to do a lot better at holding posisenior has expectations to be one of the premier backs tion and push the ball farther each time,” Patel said. in northwest Kansas — if not the state. Schumacher provides a weapon out of the backHe’s one of several seniors on this year’s Monarch field, either running the ball or catching it in the flat. football team who is hoping to buck the trend of los“Just get yards and keep the feet running,” he said ing seasons dating back the last several years. about the key to the season. “Baseball this summer helped a lot,” said SchumHe and the Monarchs will face solid defenses this acher, who played key roles in the Hays Monarchs year in the likes of Smith Center, Norton, Phillipsburg Legion team that won state and helped guide TMP’s and Plainville. baseball team to Class 3A state in the spring. “It was But he also knows TMP hasn’t been looked at as exciting and makes us want to push for a good year in a quality opponent the last several years due to the football this year.” losing records. Schumacher knows this is the last year he has to “They always look over TMP in football,” he said. make an impact on the program. So he’s leading the “It’s just what happens.” way through preseason drills, being the first in line Schumacher hopes to help get the team rolling and helping younger backs get to where they need to early against tough opponents before the final three be. That’s stood out to second-year coach Jason Cauley, district games against Phillipsburg, Norton and Russell. who knows Schumacher has the skills to be a top “Pretty much all that matters are those district player in the area this fall. games at the end of the year,” Schumacher said. “But “Gavin is pound-for-pound probably the stronthose games at the beginning of the season are just gest guy on the team,” Cauley said. “He’s 5-7, 172 pounds, and he throws up as much weight — well, not practices basically to get ready for the main event.”
TMP,
PLAINVILLE — He’s never been one to shy away from a challenge. That’s a good thing, seeing that Grant Stephenson’s team really has no choice in their opposition. The Plainville coach knows every school in the Mid-Continent League is going to face a tough schedule each year — and that includes multiple teams that are perennial powers. Now with the Cardinals making a giant leap into that upper echelon after last year — the team went 11-2 and finished as the Class 2-1A state runner-up — Plainville has added another top team to the MCL ranks. But for the Cardinals, things won’t get any easier. They lost a talented senior-laden group to graduation that accounted for much of the offensive and defensive success in 2016. And, Plainville is facing stiff competition the first three weeks of the season in the likes of Smith Center, Norton and Phillipsburg. “Those first three games, even though they are three really tough teams, they set the bar to where we need to be,” Stephenson said. “So I really like playing them, and I like playing them early because I think they make us a better team. But if things don’t go our way, you still have to be able as a coach, a staff and a team to find the positives so they can move on and play the next one. There’s a lot more season left after those three games, but win or lose, they’re going to be good for us.” Tough might not accurately describe those first three games for the Cardinals. Plainville goes on the road in Week 1 to face the Redmen, a team the Cardinals beat twice last year — including a 14-0 win in the 2-1A sub-state game. “The thing is I really like Coach (Darren) Sasse and Smith Center,” Stephenson said. “They’re a tradition that’s really good. We haven’t beat them this year, but we beat them twice last year. They’re going to have a chip on their shoulders. But we also got to play them twice on our home field last year. We’ll be going there this year twice, if we play them twice. But Sasse was great to talk to before every game and after every game last year. He’s just a great guy.” This year, Plainville opens at Smith Center. “That’s exactly what we called it last year was the gauntlet,” Stephenson said. “We even talked about what people and teams might have a chip on their shoulders, and I told them at weights one of the teams that will have the biggest chip on their shoulders after last year will be that first team that we play — Smith Center — because we beat them the very first game of the year and then at sub-state. They’re going to be hungry and ready to go Game 1. It will be a challenge to start the season.” Then the Cardinals hit the road against Norton, one of the top teams in Class 3A. Plainville beat the Bluejays 20-14 a year ago. Norton went 7-4, ending its season in the
second round of playoffs, but returns this year with senior quarterback Jace Ruder — a University of North Carolina signee. In Week 3, Plainville finally gets a home game, albeit against another 3A stalwart in Phillipsburg. The Panthers went 11-1 last year before losing to Hesston in a third-round playoff battle by 12 points. The Swathers finished as state runner-up to Rossville, losing in overtime. “That’s why I kinda like playing those three games first,” Stephenson said. “They set the standard to where it needs to be for the rest of the season. They make us better. They all count, but there’s really only one that counts that is 2A. The rest are 3A.” Stephenson is now in his third year at the helm in Plainville. He’s helped revitalize a program that was successful decades ago. “Coming in my very first year, I don’t know how much we believed in ourselves,” he said. “We seemed like we were kinda beat down and almost used to losing to Smith Center, Norton, Phillipsburg. I think that first year when we learned how to put some points on the board, it gave us some hope to carry into the next year. So when we did, especially when we won our first two games against Smith Center and Norton, I think everybody’s eyes lit up and were like, ‘Holy cow. We can beat anybody.’ That kinda gave us the confidence that was missing for several years here.” The first three games this year won’t be a cakewalk, and the Cardinals won’t be surprising anyone along the way after last year. “It really lets us know exactly where we are, and I like that,” said senior Hayden Gillum, who is beginning to get looks from NCAA Division I schools. “I like playing good competition, and it sets us up for the rest of the season. We’ll know how we come out after those games. It gives us a real look at it.” While Plainville lost numerous key players from last year, the Cardinals also got some younger players experience in a successful setting. One of those is sophomore Jared Casey. “It’s definitely going to be hard,” Casey said about the early schedule. “But last year we started 2-1 against those big three powerhouses of the MCL. We just have to go out there and give it our all.” Plainville might have been the surprise team of the MCL last fall. But this year, Stephenson knows a lot of teams will be gunning for them. “That comes with those expectations,” he said. “Then you start winning those games, and everybody in town’s expectations go up to. That’s what makes it fun. I wanted to take a program and try to take it and build it into something. I think that’s what every coach wants to do. Like I told them, that’s one good year. One good year doesn’t make me a good coach. One good year doesn’t make us a great program. That’s just one good year. You have to do that several years in a row.”
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“And Russell is going to be good, too,” Cauley said. “I don’t want to take anything away from Russell. But when people think about our district, they’re going to think about Phillipsburg and Norton — and rightfully so. They’ve earned that. We know getting into the later part of the season, we’re going to be better at that point, and we know they’re going to be better at that point. You really can’t prepare for a kid like (Jace) Ruder. You know he’s going to make his plays. You just hope to contain him a little bit and hope it doesn’t get crazy like last year. It’s hard. I don’t care what team you are, if you’re Smith Center or Phillipsburg or Colby or Abilene. It’s going to be hard to contain Jace Ruder. We just have to do our best job at it. And we have kids this year that are tired of seeing the back of No. 12’s jersey going to the endzone. I think we’re ready to hit him.” The early season slate won’t be easy either, featuring an opener at Abilene and games against Smith Center and Plainville. “It’s pretty tough,” Luke Ruder said. “This is a football and wrestling league. It’s just something you have to grind for.”
McFarland will handle the quarterback duties this fall and has had a strong preseason, according to Cauley. “He just has that knack that anything he does — whether it be basketball or football — he knows where he’s going before the play is,” Cauley said about McFarland. “He has a good read on the defense, and he has a great pre-snap read. In high school ball, if you have a good pre-snap read, that’s half the battle right there. And he has that. He throws a good ball, and he doesn’t get flustered. If something goes wrong, he’s just going to shake it off and go after it. He doesn’t hang his head on it. He just goes after the next play. We still have Luke, who has all the experience from last year, and he did a great job the first year in the offense. But I think with his athleticism and speed and getting him on the edge and putting him at H where he can line up in the backfield and do the jet sweep and go deep, he’s a deep threat. He can always come in at quarterback, and we have a little trickery we’re working with with that. Right now, the optimism is up.” Renz is a big target in the receiving game, and the TMP coach said he’s finding him-
on the other side with Renz in the middle and Ruder in the middle. And you have Karl Rack, who knows every single position on the field. All five of those kids can play. Then you throw into the mix Chase Werth backing up Gavin. He’s a good pounder who can block and catch out of the backfield. I like what we’ve got this year.” The Monarchs also switched things up defensively, and Hagans will anchor the linebacker group as only a junior. Hagans has put in a lot of work in the offseason and at camps, Cauley said, and is a building block for the defense. “Having a kid like Kaleb NICK SCHWIEN, nschwien@dailynews.net out there who is as smart as a TMP senior Creighton Renz hauls in a pass during practice whip and can grab this player and put them in this position in the preseason. and know everybody’s job self in a comfortable position the beginning of the season, (is crucial),” the coach said. he didn’t get many catches. now. “You have a quarterback like Throughout the season, we “He’s a mismatch,” that on defense, and that’s Cauley said about Renz. “We put him inside where he amazing.” can put him out there at tight could be seen more by Luke The Monarchs also will be as a target — and it worked. helped on the line with the or put him at flex or we can He’s a great competitor. And transfer of Cooper Mussman put him on the outside. We he’s going to beat some peo- from Northern Valley. His size can do whatever we want to ple deep, too. He’s 6-3, 200 with him, and he is a miswill help fill a guard position pounds. That’s a good lookin’ offensively. match. He’s so athletic, and receiver right there. And we he’s great at every sport he “The line, I feel like we’re plays — baseball, basketball. have Mayo, who was hurt pretty solid this year,” Patel all of last year. That hurt us People are going to see it on said. “A lot of our guys are a because he’s an athlete. You the football field this year. lot bigger this year, and a lot He came on late last year. At have him on one side, Garcia are seniors. With the new kid
coming in, he’s really going to help the line. We were missing a guard position until he moved in. He was all-state both ways in 1A last year.” All that optimism has the sun shining so far on the Monarchs. Bolstered by their strong senior leaders, Cauley is hoping the 2017 season is one that turns the corner for TMP, which hasn’t posted a winning record since 2011. “Not to take away from last year’s team, because I came in very late last year and we had five days of camp right after I was hired,” Cauley said. “We installed the offense and defense in that time — something totally new for all of them. After that, I couldn’t touch them again until August. We were ill-prepared last year and trying to figure out which kid was better at which spot. At mid-season, we were like Joe Flax needs to be a defensive end and Chase Werth needs to be on the defensive line. We were trying to figure it out. This year, we knew were we wanted to be with the kids, and they knew where they wanted to be. We do have a better feel for the kids. This is the second year. They know what to expect from me, and I know what to expect from them.”