THE LACONIA DAILY SUN, Friday, August 19, 2011— Page 11
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Gilford High School football coach Mark Brewer meets with his team prior to a pre-season practice at the Meadows on Thursday afternoon. Because of low participation numbers, the team won’t field a junior varsity squad this year. (Laconia Daily Sun photo/Adam Drapcho)
Gilford High football ranks pretty thin at 27 players By AdAm drApcho THE LACONIA DAILY SUN
GILFORD — A year after going 8-1 in the regular season and earning a chance to compete for the Division VI championship, Gilford football coach Mark Brewer said he’ll be happy with a 2011 regular season where his squad finishes with one more win than losses. He likes the talent and work ethic he sees during pre-season double sessions, he just wishes he had more players. As of Thursday, Brewer’s roster held 27 names. “I’d like to have 57,” he said. The 27 number is two fewer than last year, and like last year, it’s too few for Brewer to field a junior varsity team. “The last two years we didn’t have any JV team,” Brewer said. The lack of a junior varsity team makes it difficult for Brewer and his staff to develop the younger players, however, he feels he would need about five more recruits before he’d have enough players to hold their own against a junior varsity competitor. “You don’t want to send the kids out and get murdered,” he said. Brewer lost about eight seniors to graduation since last year. This year, he said his team has nine seniors but just one junior. There are more freshmen than any other grade level on the team. Brewer was disappointed to see that of the 11 freshmen who played last year, only five returned for another season. Nonetheless, Brewer expects to be competitive, because he expects the other Division VI teams will be experiencing similar challenges. Part of the phenomenon, he believes, is a change in teenage culture. “This is a commitment,” he said, watching his players run through their second session of drills on Thursday. “It requires a lot of time, a lot of commit-
ment. Unfortunately, I think there are a lot of kids these days who would rather sit in front of the TV these days and play computer games. When things get tough, you just hit the ‘restart’ button.” Another challenge for Gilford is that none of the coaching staff works in the high school. Typically there’s a coach who teaches and can thus encourage students to try out for the team. Brewer has recruited Kent Hemingway, the new superintendent to convince a few kids to give the sport a shot. “We’ve got the coaches, we’ve got the buses, we’ve got the fields, we’ve got the schedule. We’ve just got the chase those bodies,” Brewer said. If he can grow his team by enough to start a junior varsity team, and in doing so develop some depth behind his skilled veterans, Gilford could make another splash this season. Brewer pointed to Brandon Murphy, a senior who last year ran for more than 2,000 yards including post-season play. “They’re working hard, doing the best they can,” he said, as his team practiced. “We’re not going to say we’ll to much more than have fun.” from preceding page chased the $1.5 million policy shortly before he left for Aruba and that the accidental-death benefit covered only the trip. The source told the AP that Giordano called American Express Travel Insurance on Aug. 4. He sought to confirm that the documents listing him as the insurance beneficiary had been received and wanted to begin redeeming the policy. This person also said that records indicate Giordano asked whether any search costs would be covered by the policy.
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