Gans improves in loss to Graham-Dustin

Changes the Gans football team implementedwhilepreparingforitsnondistrict game versus Class C Graham/ Dustin bore fruit Friday night during the Grizzlies’ eventful home game.

Even though Gans (0-3) lost 68-36, the Grizzlies won a mental victory in the eyes of the Grizzly faithful because they were abletopostGans’firstpointsoftheseason.

Grizzlies head coach Brian Morton’s young squad was forced to quickly make wholesale changes to its offensive scheme during the week leading up to Graham’s season opener.

Those pronounced changes to the offense moved the Grizzlies’ focus from one of primarily running the football, to one that gave the eight-man squad flexibility to easily adjust its offense during the game.

“Thebigthingisthatwe’vebeentrying to hammer the ball inside,” Morton said. “We really spread the field and tried to give our kids some room to work. You’re either kinda all in or all out, and if you make a mistake with the field spread, it’s going to cost ya. But when you do things right, it can pay off big.”

Graham opened with an unexpected onside kick that the Chieftains recovered on Graham’s 45 yard line. For approximately six minutes, the Gans defense was able to slow down Graham’s march to its first touchdown.

During Gans’ next set of downs, they turned over the football with an interception. But, again, the Grizzlies’ defense proved tough.

“Defensively, I mean, we made them work,” Morton said. “When we were fresh, our kids were flying to the ball.”

The Grizzlies’ defense held Graham to one additional touchdown, which, along with PATs, gave the Chieftains 14 unanswered points by the end of the first stanza.

“We ran a couple of plays and threw an interception. The score could have very easily been closer than what it shows. I mean, our mistakes really cost us, and it’s fixable mistakes.”

In the season’s first two games, Gans struggled just advancing the football. The Grizzlies were dealing with multiple injured lettermen during the pre-season, so Morton, out of necessity, needed to start several inexperienced freshmen.

“That’s like I told the kids before. Where do we start? Well, in this game, theygaveusagoodplacetostart,andwe scored 24 points in the second quarter,” Morton said. “They were keeping their kids in, and we relaxed and kept the ball long enough to do something with it, making the score, 38-24 at the half.

“We hit some big plays, especially on kickoff returns, and then we did some big pass plays.”

Gans started the second half kicking off to Graham. Chieftains head coach Jake Dye must’ve found a wrinkle or two, and at the half, Graham made adjustments that produced results on the field.

“The third quarter was a little rough for us. We got outscored 22-0. We came out and just couldn’t get much done. We had some penalties and a big one on a kickoff return that was called back,” Morton observed.

“There was a mistake made on that kickoffreturn,andthattookalittlewind out of our sails. I’ve got some young kids, and trying to keep them focused on something when that happens is tough. We lost a little momentum in the third quarter.”

During the fourth quarter, the Grizzlies and Chieftains each scored once more before the final horn.

“Unfortunately, if you have a couple of missed snaps and a couple of missthrown balls, it can cost you big, and it does. We did that, you know, we had some key interceptions where we couldn’t stop them [returning those for a touchdown] off those interceptions.

“I really saw some kids grow up last week, and they’re starting to really fit into their positions,” Morton said. “I’ve got two defensive ends that really have stepped up with [Graham’s] tailback. He’s really hurt people on the outside. We did a good job containing him, but when he would come back inside, that’s when they made a lot of their big running plays. Not on the outside, their big running plays were the ones where they were cutting it back up the middle, and we were there, but we just had some missed tackles.”

Missed tackles, snaps and passes can all usually be chalked up to experience, or, more to the point, lack of experience, which comes with reps and a solid grasp

of fundamentals.

Morton credits the work the players did to learn their new assignments.

“We tried to throw in a complete spread offense in just one week. So next week,they’llbealittlemorecomfortable with it. There were still some questions on the field when we were making our adjustments, but we’re hoping to get those knocked out [in practice].”

The offensive effort was led by Caleb Martinwith180yardsreceiving,78yards rushing and three touchdowns; Nakota White with 16 yards receiving, 49 yards rushing and three touchdowns; and Clay Martinez with 20 yards rushing.

White was the leading defender with 11 unassisted tackles.

“Nakota White was all over the place. He worked hard for us, and he’s starting to step up into the role that we feel like he belongs,” Morton said.

This young Gans squad has come a long way in its first three games. They have had to play the first varsity games of their high school careers without the typical benefit of being on the field amongst upperclassmen playing key leadership roles.

Ideally, lettermen would support underclassmen, providing real-time guidance on the field, while also being an example, and buffer, that typically helps to offset pressure freshmen often have to experience after being thrown into the deep end of the proverbial pool.

Gans will be on the road Friday for a 7 p.m. non-district game versus Class B Midway (2-1).