By Gene Stanley/Correspondent
Gadsden City High won’t just be young this football season.
The Titans will also be inexperienced.
“What I mean is that we’ll have some juniors and se-niors that didn’t play last year,” coach Matt Scott said. “We’ve got a bunch of sophomores and freshmen, so we will be both young and inexperienced.
“But we don’t look at it that way. They’ve got the talent – we’ve just got to coach it and get ready for the season.”
There will be only 20 seniors but 45 sophomores on this year’s squad. That translates into only six re-turning starters
Don’t assume it translates into a talent-challenged group, however. Led by SEC recruit T.J. Posey, the Titans are again loaded with talent. Posey led the team in tackles last year with 65 stops from his linebacker position.
“Grades don’t matter,” Scott said. “They’ve bought into my system, they’re coachable and they’ve very talented. I look for good things to happen.”
A few of those sophomores will start, in testimony to Scott’s claim that grades don’t matter.
“This crew is very physi-cally talented,” he said. “We’re not lowering our ex-pectations because of some of them being young.”
Besides Posey, defensive lineman Chris McElderry and defensive back Tray Smothers (who had 39 tackles last year) are also getting college looks – just not necessarily from the SEC. With play, that could change, though.
As usual, the Gadsden City backfield will be loaded with speed, but this year’s team offers some versatility as well.
“We’ll have the speed,” Scott said. “But we’ve also got some physical runners who can get between the tackles. Having versatility will make us better.”
Another phase of that ve-rsatility is that some of the Titans are capable of pla-ying both tailback and slot receiver.
“That’s a luxury,” Scott said. “Most teams don’t have guys who can go in ei-ther of those positions.”
Assistant coaches are Ali Smith, Danny Stiff, Hunter Crumpton, Renza Avery Jr., Jay Tinker Jr., Daniel White, Zac Glaze, Scott Brackett, Rayshawn Edwards, Jay Estes and Scott Rickles.
For the complete 2013 Messenger Football Preview that includes team rosters, photos and schedules, purchase a copy of the Aug. 23 edition of The Messenger.