Silver Foxes aim for successful title defense in 2018
The 2018 Lamar High School varsity football team. Photo by Melissa Rollins
By Drake Horton
Contributing Writer
Lamar – The king of 1A football is getting ready to defend its crown.
The Lamar Silver Foxes kick off the 2018 season as the defending 1A state champions, but the dominance does not stop there.
Over the last three seasons the Silver Foxes have made three straight state championship appearances, winning two out of three. With that type of success it is pretty safe to say that Lamar is the measuring stick for all of 1A.
Success like that is not built over night, however. There are steps that go into building a program as stable as Lamar, making sure that players do not become complacent and while it is a challenge head coach Corey Fountain seems to have found the magic formula.
“We just try to keep ensuring that they are in the weight room and staying with our strength and conditioning program,” Fountain said. “We compete in that. We have a leader board and we have the guys compete. We just try to push these guys to set new goals every year. I mean we have the same goals, but don’t be satisfied with what you did last year because that’s last year. Nothing you did last year matters this year. Just live in the present and be the best they can be now.”
After a three-year run of dominance, Lamar returns a mixed bag of players.
“We have some key gears in our motor coming back, but we are still missing a lot coming into this season,” Fountain said. “We have to really stay healthy if we are going to be successful. Our line has to do a great job of blocking. We loss two linemen, three of our linemen are back on the OL and most of our D-Linemen are back.”
The two biggest holes that Lamar is going to have trouble replacing is its linebacker core from last year and starting quarterback Rashard Coleman.
While the defense returns six starters, the Silver Foxes basically have to start from scratch with its linebackers. Players like David Cribb and Jeblonski Green have finally exhausted their eligibility and left what was once a stacked, veteran position now young and thin.
Not to take anything away from Lamar’s defense, but it is the Silver Foxes offense that over the past three years has really become known as explosive and losing Coleman might have a bigger impact on that side of the ball than the linebackers on defense.
Running a hybrid version of the Wing T out of shotgun Lamar seemed to break one 50 plus yard touchdown play after another and while running back Jacquez Lucas was a big reason for that happening, it was the player taking the snaps that really helped everything go together offensively, according to Fountain.
“He kept the defense honest because he could throw the ball out on the perimeter, he could get it to the numbers and guys couldn’t pack the box like they have in years past on us,” Fountain said.
“For the last two years he has been able to keep the defense honest with the passing game. We are really going to miss him, we really are and hopefully right now Cameron Galloway is going to be the guy that steps in and takes his place. You know, Jacquez Lucas might step in and play a little quarterback as well.”
Galloway, who was able to get some playing time last year in mop up duty, is not the passer that Coleman was nor does he have the size, but he does bring a completely different set of skills to the table.
While Coleman could drop back and make throws, Galloway makes up for his passing deficiencies with an uncanny ability to run the football and while not being able to the throw the football would seem less than ideal, Fountain believes it can actually help his offense thrive.
“It gives us another threat in the backfield with running the football, having a QB running the football, that puts another threat on defenses,” Fountain said.
With the loss of linebackers and quarterback people might be led to believe that Lamar is rebuilding this year and Fountain, for the most part, would agree. The difference, however, is he believes if this team takes the right steps then this rebuilding could become more of just a reload instead.
“We are in a more of a rebuilding phase this year, but if we can stay healthy and keep these guys hungry they’re ready to compete every night and get better,” Fountain said. “We have to get our younger guys getting better every game, better every scrimmage and take what they learn and improve on it each week.”
The bright spot, however, for Fountain and company is that despite the fact the defense has to find new linebackers or that the offense needs a new signal caller to replace Coleman, the trenches, where most agree that the game of football is won, seems to be in pretty good shape.
“That’s the only thing that doesn’t have me panicking right now,” Fountain said. “We have some experienced guys coming back on our offensive line and defensive line.”
So is this a rebuild or reload? Right now all we can do is speculate, but if we can learn anything from the past then it should be safe to say that Lamar is going to be contender and not a pretender when the end of the season rolls around.
