Union County ready for road battle

Two and a half weeks have led to Friday's showdown in Hatley, where Union County will open the 2011 season. Preparing for the Tigers, Head Coach Scott Duley has shown his team several possibilities they could face in their first game.

Elizabeth Zaremba/file

Union County will open their 2011 season at Hatley on Friday.

Buy this photo

View Map

“I watched a clip on them from two years ago, and with it being the same coach, it will probably be the same offense,” Duley said. “Defensively, hopefully they’re about the same. It’s just with the first game, you’re not able to exchange film, and I’ve been really unable to find out a lot about them. We have been able to take what we know and showing our offense different fronts, five man, six man, four man, and we’ve been running a lot of different formations and plays against our defense so they know how to line up.”
Also spending a lot of time working with special teams, Duley is trying to best prepare his team for the addition.
“That’s taking a chunk of practice time, because although offense and defense is easy to learn watching football on television, you never really think of special teams being as significant as it is, but it is significant,” he said.
There has been a lot of growth for the team over the offseason, and Duley notes the work in the weight room being the most significant.
“The biggest progression comes from the offseason, because we were in the weight room,” he explained.
“They can do things this year physically that they couldn’t do last year. We’ve got kids able to take someone one-on-one and drive them back ten yards, and last year we couldn’t do that. We have kids who are starting to understand mentally, and they’re starting to understand the concepts, so I’m very proud of them.”
Kickoff for Union County and Hatley is set for 7:30 p.m. Friday night.