HINTON, WV- The Greenbrier East Spartans traveled to Summers County High School on Saturday morning, August 12 and opened the 2023 campaign with a Battle-of-the-Border scrimmage against the James Monroe Mavericks and the Graham G-Men.
The games were originally scheduled for Spartan Stadium, but with the new turf not being quite ready to play on, Summers County stepped up to host the schools.
The hot sun greeted the multi-team event and made playing conditions extremely challenging, but each team seemed to make it through relatively healthy.
James Monroe’s West Virginia basketball player-of-the-year and former Maverick wideout in football, Eli Allen was on the Mavs sideline throwing football with some youngsters and helping coach the current version of the team.
The Spartans struggled against the Mavericks early. East had trouble moving the ball consistently against a very good Maverick defense that will be well known this coming season.
Brody Hamric did make a few nice throws, but in the trenches, East got pushed around probably more than they wanted, but after the coaches watch film, they will find many correctable errors.
Receivers Abram Wickline and Kaden Stone, two projected starters for the Spartans, sat out and did not play on the day. Both play in the defensive backfield as well.
The Mavericks offense played well and scored once about every four plays in the beginning. Long touchdown runs from Cooper Ridgeway, and some well thrown passes were the highlights of the Mavs solid day.
East’s defense did not contain the edge as well as the staff would have liked, but again, the errors are correctable and the veteran coaching staff of the Spartans will make the necessary adjustments.
Against Graham, the defending state champions in Virginia, the Spartans seemed more poised and engaged, and played much better. They battled well with the G-Men and showed a better physical style of play, which is a great sign because Graham was a much bigger team overall than East.
There were definitely mistakes for the Spartans to clean up on both sides of the ball. They need to make sure they are playing assignment football, a term that coach Ray Lee often uses, and correct some technique-type stuff.
The physicality they showed against Graham left the coaches feeling much better about where the team is at this point, with just under two weeks to go until the regular season opener on August 25.
As for the Mavericks, at certain points of the day they looked to be in mid-season form. Another successful season awaits the Monroe County team and fans, one of the more passionate fan bases in the state.
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