By Graham Williams
The Lions started out their second curtailed season since COVID-19 started with only three seniors and four new offensive linemen, and they lost one of those seniors shortly after the season started. Many of the other players had never played in a high school football game. Due to this relative lack of upperclassmen experience and having fewer players in general, the team had an uphill battle this season. With only about 30 players, the Lions were outnumbered by most schools in the district. Sophomore Rogan Schenk, linebacker and defensive end, stated, “This season was definitely a tough one.”
The team was supposed to have a pre-season game against Fischer High School, but, unfortunately, that game was canceled. “Missing out on that opportunity to play put us at a disadvantage moving into this season,” sophomore Justin Smith, cornerback, said, presumably due to the team’s relatively inexperienced offensive linemen. The Lions already had less experience than many other schools, but they still pushed forward.
When it came time for jamboree, Louisiana went through one of the biggest hurricanes since Hurricane Katrina. This became a huge setback for the team, which missed two pre-season games in addition to weeks of practice. Another player on Lusher’s team, sophomore center, Alex Dufour, said, “That put many teams in the area on hold, so we just had to be patient.”
So, the Lions rode out the storm waiting for their chance to play. They finally got to play a game scheduled on Saturday, September 18th, against Haynes Academy. Everyone was excited during the days leading up to the game. “I’ve been waiting to finally get a game,” junior Jack Li said.
Haynes’ offense began the game running screens, a type of play, which worked out well for them. They had a strong offense and seemed to be more prepared than we were during the game. Lusher had a very big defensive play that forced a fumble which our defense returned for around 30 yards. Christian Tate scored a touchdown and ran for more than 100 yards. Unfortunately, we lost the game, but we had a lot to learn from it to prepare for our next game.
This game was just another obstacle for Lusher, and we will keep pushing on. Our team had talked about what we could have done better in the game and how we could improve. The next day the team went over some film and looked at the first couple of drives from the game. We had a great kick off from our kicker Kaj Friis-Hecht. Coach Smith was very happy about that.
“It was very fun getting out there and getting some good kicks in, “Friis-Hecht said. “I practice to make those types of kicks all the time.”
