SPENCERVILLE – A year ago at this time Spencerville had a fully assembled football team and a sparkling new weight room still under construction.
This year it’s the football team that might still need a little work.
With the departure of a strong group of seniors, including four-year starter running back/linebacker Zach Goecke, the Bearcats have some rebuilding to do on the field this season.
Spencerville is coming off back-to-back seasons of nine wins. Coach John Zerbe didn’t put a number on it, but he did say this year’s group is capable of continuing the success of recent seasons.
“We had a small senior class last year but they were almost all three-year starters and were incredibly talented and great leaders,” Zerbe said. “This year there are 16 seniors. A lot of them are guys who haven’t done it yet, they haven’t proved themselves.
“They’ve had success at different levels. “But now it’s a different thing. You get in front of fans on a Friday night and it’s just a different ball game,” he said.
The Bearcats have returning starters at 11 positions – six on offense and five on defense.
Two of the returning starters were first-team All-Northwest Conference last season – defensive lineman Dakota Prichard and running back Calvin Wilson.
Prichard played defensive line, tight end and was the top punter in the NWC. He could be the starting quarterback this season.
Wilson rushed for 861 yards as the No. 2 rushing option behind Goecke on a team that averaged 408.4 yards a game on the ground and 447.9 yards a game overall. Defensive back Cody Dickson also was a second-team All-NWC choice and had four interceptions.
Defensive lineman Nick Freewalt, offensive lineman Damon Jenkins and running back Chris Picker were honorable mention All-NWC last fall.
Picker gained 749 yards last season as a sophomore. Zerbe said Wilson, Picker and Keaton Lotz combined for as many rushing yards last season as the 1,880 yards Goecke had.
“We have running backs, it’s just replacing those linemen who were so valuable for us,” Zerbe said.
“This team has one of the best attitudes of any team I have ever coached. There are no stars, they are all about each other. We just are inexperienced. We have guys who haven’t played yet. I think they’re going to do very well when they get their chance but we won’t really know until we play,” he said.
Until then, Zerbe is preaching a message of being uncommon to the Bearcats.
“Our team theme is to be uncommon this year. It means distance yourself from what everyone else is doing and do different things and maybe you’ll get different results,” Wilson said.
The Bearcats are aiming high, Freewalt said. “The goal is win the NWC and make the playoffs. We have to keep building off the last couple years and I think we’ll be good,” he said.
The expectations created by the last two seasons are something that pushes the Bearcats, Wilson said.
“It gives us a high goal to shoot for. Our coaches have high expectations too. We have trust in the players because a lot of them that are starting this year could have started last year. We just had a lot of seniors in those positions last year,” he said.
Spencerville opens its season Friday night at home against Patrick Henry.
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