SALEM
Coach Mike Kelly said participating in a scrimmage at Salem on Friday night was a good experience for his Seymour football team.
“I thought we saw a lot of positives. We got a lot of young guys in tonight,” Kelly said. “Several guys were away and had some things going on, so we got a lot of new guys, new faces in tonight to give them an opportunity to compete. We got to see guys that aren’t quite ready to be at the varsity level, and we got to see some guys that said, ‘Hey, I’m ready to stick my nose in here and get after it.’ We saw a lot of positives tonight.”
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The Owls scrimmaged against Salem, Charlestown and Providence on offense and defense at both the varsity and junior varsity levels.
“These teams are all very athletic, very competitive and I think are going to have great seasons this year, and a lot of that has to do with just playing hard and getting after it,” Kelly said.
Ty Weddell, a junior defensive back, said the team has worked on playing better as a unit.
“We need all-around communication,” he said. “We’re not communicating enough. Play calls aren’t being heard around the whole defense. We need to be more vocal because we’re not talking enough. We’re not where we want to be, but we’re making progress. We need to work hard in practice.”
One of the things Kelly looked for at the scrimmage was consistency from his kids.
“At times, we ran the ball well. At times, we threw the ball well,” he said. “The challenge is not to have ‘at times.’ We saw three different types of defenses. You get a variety of fronts in front of you, so from an offensive perspective, that’s important.
“From a defensive perspective, we saw three different types of offenses. We lined up against those three different offenses, so that’s important teaching our guys how to play. Sometimes, we’re getting process by analysis. We’re trying to read the whole picture, and it’s just ‘Go hard and get after it.’ I saw a little bit of that tonight both offensively and defensively, and I think those are things we can fix and correct.
“We just need to play assignment-sound football. A lot of times, you peek your head in a hole that you shouldn’t have because you’re interested instead of staying disciplined. Everything we do revolves around discipline — being disciplined to finish, being disciplined to work hard, being disciplined to do your job and do your assignment. It boils down both offensively and defensively to that on the guys that are disciplined.”
Jackson Lowe, an incoming senior, will be a running back-receiver on offense and line up at linebacker on defense. He played tight end last year.
“I’m playing a new position, so the Bishop Dullaghan Camp (in June) helped me improve a lot,” he said. “I feel like every year you to go to BD, you’re going to get better. It’s three days of good football.
“I’m primarily an outside force. It’s my first year playing linebacker,” he said. “We’ve improved a lot. We had a lot of guys leave last year, so almost everyone (on defense) is new.”
The Owls are off this week and will return for team camp next week.
Official fall practice starts Aug. 5.
The Owls will scrimmage against Silver Creek on Aug. 16 and open their regular season Aug. 23 against South Dearborn at Bulleit Stadium.
“I think we need to grow as a team,” Kelly said. “In that camp environment, you’ve got to get together and become a team, and that is something we’ve got to get better at. We’ve got some guys that work hard, and we’ve got some guys that think they work hard. We tell them all the time we can’t mistake activity for productivity. Sometimes, we expect to achieve something without being productive in our work, so we’ll challenge them to do that.”