By TOM HALLIBURTON
Port Arthur News Sports Writer
PORT NECHES – Obviously the Indians completely have fallen off their rockers here. Send out the alarms. Port Neches-Groves is experimenting with the shotgun.
Keeping its calling-card, grind-it-out approach on the back burner, PN-G spent spring football in the shotgun formation 90 percent of the time, according to head coach Matt Burnett.
How times have changed at The Reservation!
“We’ve been doing our other offense for seven years, so we figure we know it pretty well,” said Burnett, using the rationale that the spring time is the right time to experiment if a team is going to experiment.
“We like it and we plan to keep some of it,” the Indians’ chief continued. “We were committed to running the shotgun for the whole spring.”
Senior-to-be quarterbacks Kirk Hallmark and John Frasier liked the shotgun too. Their ability to operate from the formation factored plenty into PN-G’s decision.
“It’s such a unique thing to PN-G,” Burnett said. “We’re doing that because we’re willing to do everything we can to win games. So we will examine film of it this summer and determine what path we’re going to take.”
Burnett also felt PN-G’s defense became a beneficiary from the shotgun. The Indians have felt a need to become more able to stop a wide-open offense and to utilize zone blitz packages.
Color the Indians daring and different.
They gave Burnett and his staff plenty of entertaining video to dissect from PN-G’s purple and white game May 17 at Indian Stadium.
Hallmark played quarterback for more than half of last season, due to injuries to a pair of PN-G seniors. His strong arm and his running ability are utilized more effectively in the shotgun.
The playmaking skills of the smaller Frasier offers PN-G an interesting quarterback tandem.
Numerous position experiments clicked effectively in spring camp, which started April 23 and never exceeded more than two hours a day.
Last year’s defensive tackle Jeremy Davis (6-4, 280) impressed the coaches at offensive tackle. Keegan Swann adapted well at free safety and Adam Guillory did the same at outside linebacker. Swann and Guillory started at cornerbacks for the 2000 Indians.
The need to replace veteran linebackers Cody Clark and Trayce Boudoin becomes very important to PN-G’s success. Sophomore-to-be Dylan Brown is a strong candidate to fill Clark’s vacancy, while seniors-to-be Travis Staudt and Cory Broaddus compete for Boudoin’s job.
Soccer player Thomas Bell will be a senior and will be among the leaders to replace Joey Price as the Indians’ kicker. PN-G has needed a receiver to fill Price’s departure, too, and senior-to-be Brian Poulter has been “one of the big surprises of the spring.”
A fullback last season, Brady Flores switched to tailback and produced a good spring until a shoulder separation halted his off-season work in the team’s third scrimmage. Sophomore-to-be Ben Davis displayed good promise at running back as the spring progressed.
“We had fun,” Burnett said. “The coaches had fun with it. We had kids scrimmaging twice a week, so the kids always had something to look forward to. We felt we got a lot out of that format.”
