Without May Drills, Regular Season Could Bring Chills, Not Thrills

For those who question the importance of spring football practice, Western High School Coach Jim Howell refers them to 1982.

It had been 10 years since Western had won a league title. During that time, the Pioneers had not qualified for the Southern Section playoffs. Even winning seasons were few and far between.

The time had come to shake things up a bit. So Howell installed the Wing-T offense.

The Pioneers spent the spring learning the Wing-T--the options, the dives, the sweeps. Because it’s a complicated offense, based on deception, the players needed time to adjust.

But they did.

The following fall, Western finished 7-3 and won the Orange League.

“We weren’t really sure about the offense at first,” Howell said. “We didn’t know whether the kids could run it properly. Fortunately, we had the spring to work on it.”

Football practice has always been one of the rites of spring. Coaches say the two- or three-week period in May and June can make a difference in the fall. Besides learning the intricacies of an offense or defense, it is also a time to develop leadership and camaraderie.

Under Southern Section rules, a team can practice from May 21 through the end of the school year in June, excluding Sundays. Although no contact drills are allowed, coaches say a lot can be accomplished.

“It serves a purpose,” El Modena Coach Bill Backstrom said. “We get our kids together for 10 days in the spring. You’re not going to find a quarterback in that amount of time, but it’s a chance to blend the team’s personalities and for the coaches to get to know the new players.”

Or for the players to get to know the new coach.

Over the winter, Martin Luczaj was hired as the coach at Buena Park. Luczaj has taught and coached at Fullerton for the past nine years and knows little about the Coyotes’ program and its players.

During the spring, the Coyotes will have to learn their coach and his offensive and defensive philosophies.

“Spring is probably more beneficial to someone in my position than it is to a coach who has already established his program,” Luczaj said. “It will give me a chance to introduce my techniques and terminology.”

In six years as Fullerton coach, Luczaj compiled a 52-19 record, winning three league titles and a Southern Section championship.

The cornerstone of Luczaj’s success was a sophisticated passing offense, which he also plans to use at Buena Park. This spring, there will be a lot for the Coyote players to learn.

“We would like to come out of the spring organized to the point where we know where we’re going,” Luczaj said. “It’s really a good time to get some teaching done.”

Luczaj said spring practice also will prepare his team for the summer passing leagues, which have become more prevalent in recent years. Teams participate in passing leagues and tournaments in late June and throughout July.

Some coaches and administrators have said that, with the increased activity in the summer, spring practice has become obsolete.

However, summer participation is limited to skill-position players: quarterbacks, running backs, wide receivers and defensive backs. Southern Section rules do not allow tackling, and prohibit the use of tackling dummies and blocking sleds in the summer.

“If the only people who played football were wide receivers and defensive backs, then only having the summer would be fine,” said Herb Hill, who retired last fall after 38 years of coaching, 28 of which were at Loara.

“But in the summer, you can’t use blocking bags or blocking sleds, so there really isn’t anything you can do with the linemen. You need time to work with them. Linemen are made, they’re not born.”

Bill Brown of Century will be trying to find some players who can play on line this spring. The school opened two years ago and the Centurions will play on the varsity level in the fall for the first time.

Century had teams on the sophomore and freshman levels last season.

“We’ll be lifting weights like crazy, trying to get our kids big enough to line up against varsity teams,” Brown said. “We’ll also do a lot of work on blocking sleds just to get the basics down.”

Several coaches said they don’t do much conditioning during the spring practice time, mainly because it would be wasted. The season is still too far away and the kids will be out of shape again by the end of the summer.

But there is a mental edge to be gained from spring workouts.

“At that time, the juniors realize that they will be seniors the next year,” Trabuco Hills Coach Jim Barnett said. “It gets through to them that it’s their year of high school football. If they’re going to be good leaders and take charge in August, they have to start thinking about it in May.”

Backstrom said he uses spring practice as a way to develop unity among his players.

The Vanguards go through drills, work on technique and push around blocking sleds. But the last day of spring practice is a beach party.

“It really brings the team together and the kids start getting excited about the fall,” Backstrom said. “We eat hot dogs and play volleyball and football. At the end, we elect the team captains for the following season. It really brings the kids together.”

Spring practice, though, is not just for the players. With the constant turnover of assistant coaches, head coaches need the time to drill their staffs.

“You have to teach the staff as well as the kids,” said Howell, who has been the coach at Western since 1979. “We have staff meetings to go over how our practices will be run, then we got out and have some real life experience at it.

“There are too many benefits from spring football to eliminate it. I know we probably wouldn’t have won the league title in 1982 without it.”