By Jeff Johncox
Some say, “Don’t mess with a good thing.”
Others say, “If you’re not adjusting, you’re not winning.”
Washington coach Dennis McCray isn’t afraid of a little change.
Neither is Norman North’s Lance Manning, or Noble’s Ray Crawley, or Westmoore’s Chris Davis.
All have their teams doing something different on the football field this season.
The spread offense has a lot to do with it.
The spread has become the offense of choice around college football. After Oklahoma succumbed to the fast, wide and pass-happy offense, it wasn’t too long until even Nebraska dropped its historic option to join in the high-scoring fun.
So, it’s no surprise high-school teams across the country are following college’s example. I mean, those colleges need to find players who are familiar with the offense to plug into their systems, right?
Well, most high-school squads across the state switched to the spread some time ago. Norman High did it last year.
One of the last holdouts in the western half of the state, Westmoore, is going to the offense this season.
Former coach Mike Whaley was known for taking his team deep into the playoffs while still using his run-heavy, old-school offense. But before he left for the Oklahoma Secondary School Activities Association, even Whaley switched the Jaguars to the spread.
Crawley, a former Whaley assistant, is bringing the offense to Noble now, too.
“We’re going to spread it out a little bit,” Crawley said last week. “We’re going to have a different look. We lost most of our linemen up front, so we’re going to be taking on a new identity. We’re not going to be the same team we were two years ago, or even last year.”
The Bears have had since the spring to get used to the new offense, and it’s something Crawley says they’re excited about.
“The mentality here is changing,” Crawley said. “I attribute some of that to what they’re doing over at OU and on Sundays. They spread it out and throw it everywhere, and we’re going to try and do that. We were kind of the last ones to fight it in the upper classes.”
North has been running the spread since Manning showed up to take over the program in 2005.
There was a rough transition period, and the T-Wolves struggled to a 1-9 record that season. It was the same at NHS last year, when new coach Greg Nation’s spread offense took a bit of getting used to. The Tigers finished 2-8.
But North’s coming off three straight quarterfinals appearances and back-to-back 9-3 seasons.
Now they’re making changes defensively to keep up with the spread from other teams, namely switching to the 3-4.
“There’s some areas where we’re going to be more athletic than we were last year,” Manning said.
Then there’s McCray, who’s had a lot of success the past few seasons running the spread down in Washington.
The Warriors won the district their first season in Class 2A.
But rather than staying the course, McCray wants to make sure his team is always improving, and that means putting the spread away and switching to an offense better-equipped to match his players’ size, speed and tendencies: the flex-bone option.
“We’ve revamped completely,” McCray said. “It’s an offense we ran back in 2002 and 2003. It suits our personnel better.”
What about not messing with a good thing?
“I’ve always been a believer that you can’t have a firm philosophy in high-school football, because you don’t always have the players to put into that philosophy,” McCray said. “You can’t fit a square peg into a round hole.
On the Web
Be sure to check out our new weekly Web version of On Preps, every week at normantranscript.com. We’re tracking two area teams every week.
This week it’s North’s and Little Axe’s turns. Next week we’ll focus on NHS and Community Christian.
Jeff Johncox
366-3535
jjohncox@normantranscript.com
