By Rob Patrick
The Bryant Hornets and the Little Rock Hall Warriors will play their AAA benefit scrimmage tonight as[more] a regulation four-quarter game including the kicking game. The scrimmage starts at 6 p.m. After the game, the teams’ third string players will scrimmage for 10 plays for each offense.
The Hornets will be tuning up for their 2012 season opener at home against the rival Conway Wampus Cats on Friday, Aug. 31.
“The last couple of years, we haven’t gotten everything we needed out of the scrimmage,” stated Bryant head coach Paul Calley. “I feel like the kicking game is a very important part. We need to be able to coach it and, in order to be able to coach it, we’ve got to get it on film.”
Asked what he wanted to see from his team in the scrimmage, Calley said, “I want to see execution and I want to see effort. Defensively, I think, we’re ahead of our offense right now.
“We’ve thrown a lot at them offensively,” he noted. “We’re going to be pretty simple in the scrimmage. I want to see us execute simple schemes, simple plays.”
Added new offensive coordinator Lance Parker, “I just want to make sure we’re hanging onto the ball, that we’ve got our system where we’re smooth with our substitutions, and just staying on blocks. We’re going to have a few mental errors but, hopefully, we’ll squeeze the football and everything will look crisp with our fundamentals.”
Defensive coordinator Steve Griffith said of the defense, “We want to see aggressive play — the defensive line getting off ball, linebackers coming downhill, secondary breaking on the ball, coming downhill and tackling.
“We feel like we’re well ahead of where we were at this point last year,” he added. “We’re just hoping to see evidence of that on the field.”
“The main thing is effort,” Calley emphasized. “If we make mistakes but we’re going full speed, I can live with that. It’s the loafs that it’s hard to live with as a coach. We want to make sure we eliminate that right off the bat. If they’re tired, we’ll get somebody in for them.”
