Two-a-days preparing Lions to roar

King’s Academy Head Football Coach Larry Watson feels pretty optimistic about the upcoming season. Facing more challenges than a lot of Division 2 schools have, Coach Watson is improving the overall program by demanding more of his players. “The new guys have great attitudes,” Coach Watson said, “The work ethic is rising among all the players because we’ve raised the bar of what we expect out of them.” The basic philosophy of the offense is keeping it on the ground. The strength of the offense is the running option. The squad is working to get comfortable with the offense and they will be doing a lot of those reps during practice. With an inexperienced and smaller front line this season they will have to stay patient. The offense will be overcoming their disadvantage by spreading out, to give the opposing defenses many different looks. The team will have many formations coming up to the line so as not to telegraph the called play. The defense is based on the 4-3. “The front four are kind of small but we want the gaps filled,” said Watson, “the linebackers are being groomed for this. We don’t have a lot of experience in the defense other than the DBs and we don’t know yet how the guys will step up, but we won’t have a dominating front four.” Coach Watson says their opposing teams have not been known to be passing teams and wants to see confidence grow in his players with the 4-3. The special teams will not be as solid as in past seasons. King’s Academy benefited from good soccer-style kickers in the past, but not this year. Coach Watson stated, “We have to develop the kicking game. We’re devoting much practice time to this. There won’t be any long field goal attempts. I feel comfortable going for field goals when we get inside the 20 but we are going to be working on this.” The Lions will also be looking to improve containment on the punting game. It is hoped that the special teams work might develop a solid, if not excellent, aspect to the overall performance of King’s Academy’s football this season. T.K.A. is unusual among Tennessee high schools due to its high enrollment of international students. Naturally you will see some of them on the field. The coach enjoys his international mixture, “We get some good athletes. Not necessarily good football players, but good athletes.” When asked if language becomes a problem, Coach Watson replied, “Terms like ‘Red Dog’ or ‘Bull Dog’ sometimes won’t translate too good to the new kids, but the experienced players help out well. There is good team support here. Now during a game, if a check-off or something similar comes up it can be a problem, but it’s an interesting situation. Especially if a player shouts out instructions in his home language to another player, something may sound similar to profanity in English!”