Better Eight Than Never : An Abbreviated Version of Traditional Football Makes Its Mark at High Schools

Eight-man football.

The very name seems to indicate an inferior brand of football. Inferior and informal.

Remember those pre-teen fall afternoons, playing football in the street or on a lot with anywhere from four to eight players on a team? Go long, you would tell a receiver while diagramming a play with your fingers in the palm of your hand, and make a sharp left at the station wagon.

Fun it was. Football it really wasn’t.

Great for youngsters, but 8-man football at the high school level? That would seem to be the type of radical departure from tradition that would mean a travesty in most sports. How seriously could you take seven-man prep baseball, with perhaps an outfielder and a shortstop missing, or four-man prep basketball, minus a guard or a forward?

But the result in high school football, for the most part, has turned out to be anything but a travesty.

Instead, those high schools across the country that use the 8-man format have produced a wide-open, exciting game that is often a dream situation for the kind of coach who likes to while away spare time drawing X’s and O’s on everything from napkins to old laundry receipts.

Got a crazy formation? This is the place to try it.

Let’s see, we could go with four receivers and no running backs. Or, we could place the quarterback and the center in the middle of the field with the other six players split to one side, making the center eligible. Or we could split three men to one side and three to the other.

On defense, we could go with a two-man line, three linebackers and three defensive backs. Or how about a 3-3-2? Or even seven on the line and one back.

All of the above and more have been used in the 8-man game with varying results. It’s not always good, but it’s rarely dull.

Recently, punter Don White of Campbell Hall, a North Hollywood school that plays the 8-man version, booted a disastrous kick. The ball traveled three yards forward and then bounced back to White in the backfield. He picked it up and ran 46 yards for a touchdown.

Football at every level has its crazy plays, but the 8-man game often seems to be a never-ending highlight film simply because there are fewer bodies on the field to maintain order.

Eight-man ball is not a game of gang-tackling because it is difficult to get the whole gang together at any point on the field. It’s much more of a man-to-man game.

“Eight-man football is a defensive nightmare,” said Chris Schultz, head coach at Buckley School in Sherman Oaks. “There is no way to defend realistically because you’re missing one defensive back. In a one-on-one situation, just about anybody can be beaten. Since you don’t have that extra safety to help out, if the cornerbacks take one step up, they can get beat.”

No argument there from Harry Morgan who has been coaching 8-man football at Faith Baptist in Canoga Park for a decade.

“In 11-man football, the defender gets a little help,” he said. “He doesn’t have as much responsibility as he does in this system.

“Eight-man football takes a little more intensity, better tackling techniques. But, it’s a pretty good game. It really is. You don’t gamble as much defensively because if you get out of position and leave a hole, the man is gone.”

Kirk Duncan, head coach at Campbell Hall, believes football is football.

“I don’t buy the wide-open theory,” he said. “I think 8-man football turns out not to be more wide open. Like any level of football, people get real comfortable doing certain things, like running the ball.

“But if you throw the ball, you can rack up some numbers in this game. Because you have to go one-on-one, you can get these kids turned around trying to cover a receiver.”

When it comes to turning youngsters around, Duncan has a quarterback--Ty Leatherman--who can make defensive backs look like whirling dervishes. In a game against Webb, Leatherman connected on 26 of 53 attempts for 412 yards and 6 touchdowns. In the school’s first five games this season, Leatherman threw for more than 1,000 yards and 15 touchdowns.

“I’d rather watch an 8-man game over the 11-man game,” Schultz said. “There is always something happening, always the chance of a big play, always the chance for a touchdown. It’s a speed game. And it’s not unusual to score 40 points in a game.”

But 8-man football was not created because of the resultant numbers that would be put on the scoreboard. It was created because of the numbers on the bench.

There are a lot of high schools that simply don’t have the enrollment to field a full-size squad, which can number between 30 and 35. For example, at Rio Hondo Prep in Arcadia, the total enrollment is 35. And that is a co-ed school.

So the answer is the 8-man game, where the majority of players play offense, defense and even special teams.

“About 11 guys wind up playing,” Morgan said, “or maybe 12 or 13. You put in any more than that and you’re not going to win much.”

Winning has not been a problem for Morgan. He led Faith Baptist to a Southern Section title in 1984 and to five league championships and nine playoff berths in the 10 years he has coached.

“To me, it’s no different than winning in 11-man ball,” he said. “An accomplishment is an accomplishment.”

For Ken Roupe, coach at First Lutheran in Sylmar, it is an accomplishment just fielding a team.

“I only have 10 kids on my squad,” he said. “We just simply could not play 11-man football. This is a lot more practical. Some of my kids never come off the field. We put a sub in only if someone gets hurt or needs a breather.”

Which isn’t necessarily a bad way for players to learn the game.

“No question you have to be more well-rounded in 8-man,” Roupe said. “The linemen have to be able to stop the run as well as a linebacker. You need to use your backs more as blockers. The players often are not as big as those in 11-man, but they are quicker and have to be in better shape.”

With fewer boys to man the battle stations, the field of battle has been cut down. Instead of 100 yards-by-53 yards, it is only 80-by-40.

“We play it a lot like sandlot ball,” Schultz said, “but realistically, it’s the same football. There are some very, very good players playing 8-man football. We are just low in enrollment. I’d like to see the 1-A champions, for example, play against an 8-man team. I’d like to see them defend against our players. It’s a lot more difficult than it looks.”

Some 8-man players could make the transition to the 11-man game without missing a step, but what about the even bigger jump from 8-man to college football?

“It seems like the college players are getting bigger and bigger, but no, I don’t think they have an advantage,” Roupe said. “Our players have to be in much better condition than in 11-man ball because they have to play so much.”

In Schultz’s opinion, the leap from 8-man to college ball varies depending on where you’re leaping from.

“If you’re a down lineman,” he said, “there isn’t that big a change going to college. The basics are still the same. You have to block and tackle. And the size is still there.”

Abel Jimenez, a 5-10, 230-pound fullback-nose guard for First Lutheran, doesn’t think he’s giving up anything by playing 8-man football.

“Playing both ways has got to help if you go on to college ball,” he said. “In 8-man, you’ve got to cover more ground. Those who are used to 11-man may get tired before you do.”

Talk about getting tired, 8-man football was preceded in the Southern Section by 6-man football. That was from 1966 to ’73.

The 8-man game was begun in 1974 and now boasts two conferences--8-man large and small, based on the size of the schools, not the players. In all, the Southern Section has eight 8-man leagues, comprising 45 schools, and the game is played in most states.

Despite its presence on the national prep scene, 8-man football often can turn off college recruiters. Even success stories like Toi Cook, a defensive back for the New Orleans Saints who played at Montclair Prep when the school had an 8-man program, cannot shake 8-man football’s reputation as being inferior.

“They won’t look twice simply because these kids don’t have experience with the 11-man game,” Schultz said. “But we have a few who could play college ball. The only difference between our top-notch athletes and those in an 11-man program in terms of recruiting is that ours just don’t play against other top-notch athletes on a day-to-day basis. They don’t get the experience daily that can hone their skills.”

Morgan said the chance of getting an 8-man player into a major-college program “depends on the coach’s credibility with the big schools. If it’s good, you’ve got a shot at getting anybody anywhere. The percentages of going to a major college are not any better if you’re playing 11-man football.”

No argument on one point: The number of kids worthy of consideration by college recruiters is much smaller in 8-man than it would be in most 11-man programs. But on the plus side, that lack of big stars opens the door for many players of lesser talent.

“We offer a chance,” Schultz said, “to a lot of kids, some of whom wouldn’t play at bigger schools. Here they have the opportunity.”