Football’s back. Well … almost. Local high school teams can begin practices for the 2023 season on Monday, July 31.
St. Cloud will get a jump on all teams as they will open their pre-season camp with their second annual Midnight Madness practice – hitting the field just a few minutes after 12 a.m. Monday morning.
“It created a lot of excitement last year,” head coach Mike Short said. “It’s just something different and a fun to start pre-season camp with.” Short, who led St. Cloud to a 7-3 mark his first season, says he is “quietly optimistic” heading into his second year.
The optimism stems from the fact that he returns some outstanding talent on both sides of the ball, including junior quarterback Logan King, skill spot player T.J. Griffin, receiver Owen Conner and lineman Conner Howes. King is a two-year starter who threw for 1,900 yards and 18 touchdowns as a sophomore and Conner is a junior tackle who already has had numerous D-1 offers.
Depth has been an issued at St. Cloud in recent years with several starters going both ways – a situation Short says is improving.
“Right now we have maybe two guys who are going to start both ways but that’s mainly because of how talented they are. We have played a lot of young players over the last two seasons and those guys got a lot of reps and are ready to step in and claim starting spots. You always worry about depth but I like our top 11 on both sides of the ball.”
When Celebration opens camp on Monday, Coach Jeremy Palmer will have just a handful of returning players on both sides of the ball from a team that went 1-9. Palmer will have an incredibly young team with 27 freshmen and sophomores on his roster. The Storm has only had a few winning seasons in school history, something that Palmer said he is working hard to change.
“The few times we had a good record, the head coach would leave for another opportunity usually the very next year. You can’t build any consistency that way. I’m planning on being here for the long haul and build that consistency that we have been missing.”
Led by junior center Gavin Konopka, the Storm offensive line should be the strength of the team; while sophomore Landen Yaw has the inside track at becoming Celebration’s starting quarterback.
At Harmony, long-time assistant Nick Lippert takes over Under Don Simon, Harmony won six games last year and earned an at-large playoff bid.
Although Lippert loses his two top two running backs and quarterback to graduation and saw leading tackler Dalton Phelan transfer to Lake Nona, he also believes his team has the talent to be competitive again.
“Jeremy Hilliard is a talented back who has waited his turn behind Tyler Emans and Cooper Richards for two seasons. I have a lot of confidence that he can have a big year for us.”
Defensively, Lippert returns three talented defenders in defensive backs Alex Nash (Central Michigan commit) and Chase Adams, as well as defensive tackle Clayton Williams.
“Although I don’t think we’ll be as one dimensional on offense, our bread and butter will be the running game and defense,” Lippert said.
Long the gold standard in the county, Osceola will enter the season as favorites to repeat as district Champions and retain its title as top team in the county. Although Eric Pinellas lost a huge list of senior starters – including five who inked D-1 scholarships – it’s doubtful any area coaches are shedding tears for the Kowboys, who went 10-4 last season and made it to the Class 7A state semifinals. Its four losses were to state champion Lakeland (twice), former state champion Seminole and 5A power Jones.
Not only do the Kowboys return the vast majority of a very talented offensive line, but Osceola is also a team that reloads, rather than rebuilds on a season–to-season basis. Star running back Taevion Swint (UCF commit), WR Notorious Reynolds, LB Elijah Morales, SS Jalen Bell, CB Ja’Mario Bradford, S Jeff Banks, and RB Jeff Sinophat are just a few of the outstanding players Pinellas will have at his disposal.
The big question for the Kowboys will be at quarterback as a pair of transfers --Anthony Powers (Live Oak) and Cameron West (Tohopekaliga) -- will battle in camp to replace last year’s starters David Buggs (graduation) and Gunner Holland (senior who left team to concentrate on wrestling).
Scheduled to face seven playoff teams in the regular season, Osceola may be hard-pressed to win 10 games again, but the Kowboys be heavily favored to win its district that includes Celebration, Tohopekaliga and St. Cloud.
Anthony Paradiso turned around Tohopekaliga’s program quickly, posting six wins in his first season after taking over a team that went 2-8 the year before. Several talented senior transfers aided in the turnaround who have now graduated, but Toho has a lot of firepower returning – including sophomore quarterback Sabby Meassick, who passed for 3081 yards and 38 touchdowns as a freshman. Julian Nasco is a top returning receiver and Churandy Duval is a threat as both a runner and receiver.
Still, Paradiso’s lines struggled against better competition in Bishop Moore, Harmony and Osceola last season – something that the veteran coach said would need to be improved upon. He has started to see those results. “One of our linemen was struggling to bench 225 last summer, he improved to 340 this year,” Paradiso said. “It’s typical of the improvement we were looking for and I think it’s a good example of the dedication and work these guys have put in to get bigger and stronger. We started a young offensive line against Osceola last year and simply could not compete against them physically. Hopefully we are turning the corner.”
Poinciana had only is second winning season in school history last year, going 8-2 under Randy Beeken as an independent. The Eagles hope to build off of that record and may have the firepower to do so. Ernest Nunn, Elijah Bowser and Akeem Knox all have big-play capabilities for the Eagles.
Beeken says Poinciana’s independent status gave them the flexibility to schedule all 10 opponents.
“We looked at it and tried to schedule a third of our opponents we thought we should beat, a third that we knew we would be pretty even with and a third that we would have to play well to beat and I think it played out that way. After decades of struggling, we are trying to build a program and being an independent for now was the best way to try and accomplish that.”
First-year Liberty Coach Dee Hart has a tremendous rebuilding job in front of him, taking over a Charger team that went 0-10 and was out-scored 453-12 last year. The former Alabama and Colorado standout may be the right person for the job, as Liberty traditionally had a solid core of athletes.Hart will attempt to build his program around quarterback Jeremiah Pierre-Louis and running back J.J. Vaughan on offense and brothers Xae’dyn and Xae’vez Brown on defense. He also has nearly 40 new players on his roster.
Veteran Gateway coach Marlin Roberts expects to welcome 42-50 players when camp opens on Monday. Perhaps no program in the county has been ravaged by injuries like the Panthers, who went through four starting quarterbacks a year ago.
Depth and health will be a huge key for the Panthers, who have some talented players on the roster like OL/DL Chris Charity, RB/CB Delvin Pryor and athlete Josh Fuller, but Gateway must stay healthy and develop some depth as they try to improve on last year’s two-win season.
The first few days of the workouts will be in helmets and shorts. Each team will play a preseason Kickoff Classic on the weekend of Aug. 18. Those games include: Gateway at Wesley Chapel, Haines City at St. Cloud, Pine Ridge at Celebration; Apopka at Osceola; American at Harmony; Timber Creek at Tohopekaliga.
