Published: 10:49 PM, Tue Jul 13, 2010
Football teams stay sharp with 7-on-7 scrimmages
By Earl Vaughan Jr.
Scholastic sports editor
It's a blistering July evening at Cape Fear High School. Maybe a couple dozen fans sit in the shade of the press box on the home team's side of the football stadium, watching Colts players in helmets, shorts and shirts in a game against Jack Britt.
But this isn't a normal football game. There are only seven players competing on each side - the quarterback, running backs and receivers on offense, and defensive backs and linebackers on defense.
The teams are competing in an approved pass skeleton drill, or as most people call it, 7-on-7. For years, the North Carolina High School Athletic Association has allowed schools to scrimmage 7-on-7 during the summer, as long as there's no body-to-body contact.
Coaches say 7-on-7 drills have limitations. But, if used correctly, they can be a valuable learning experience for players heading into the regular season.
Positives
For the most part, the players involved in 7-on-7 drills this summer say they are finding the experience helpful.
Jack Britt tight end Eric McLain, for example, says it's giving him a chance to practice running crisp and precise pass routes. And teammate Ryan Gipson, a strong safety, calls the summer drill a crucial warm-up to the regular season.
The drill is particularly popular among quarterbacks, who like being in passing situations without worrying about being sacked.
"The defensive line doesn't key any of your reads in the passing game," Cape Fear quarterback Michael Bridgeman said. "Mainly you read the safeties and what the defensive backs are going to do."
Most coaches agree that the 7-on-7 drills are great for helping quarterbacks learn to read defenses. Even Seventy-First coach Bob Paroli, who is well-known for his disdain of passing offenses, is using the drill this summer to help develop some of his young QBs.
"It can be of great benefit if used the right way," Paroli said.
But coaches insist the 7-on-7 drill is not just for offenses. For the defenses, it can be a vital teaching tool for basics like pass drops by linebackers and coverage responsibilities for the defensive backs.
"Defensively, it helps us establish our schemes and understand coverages," South View coach Randy Ledford said. "It's a semi-game situation where they have to be able to adapt as the course of the evening goes on."
It doesn't hurt, either, that the teaching is done in a relaxed summer setting.
"Sometimes we'll say stop and ask them to show it to us again," Cape Fear coach Bobby Bennett said. "We're walking our kids through it. We can stop and teach.
"Fall is so compressed, we need more time at the front end of the season. This is a help for us to get ready."
Negatives
Coaches say one of the biggest disadvantages of the 7-on-7 format is that not all players are involved. By definition, linemen are left out of the drill. And when schools compete - like Jack Britt and Cape Fear earlier this month - both offensive and defensive players see limited action.
To maximize their given time, some coaches try to do things differently. Ledford, for example, prefers not to take advantage of the intersquad option, instead using the summer months to let his players train against each other.
"We need to work all of our kids all the time," Ledford said. "This gives us more time to look at each kid and see exactly where we need to be on offense or defense. I think we're getting more repetitions than anything."
Paroli finds the drill more effective by changing the rules. In a system taught to him by Charlotte Independence coach Tommy Knotts, Paroli prefers to re-spot the ball at the 40-yard line to start each possession, giving the offense 60 yards to drive for a score.
Teaching tool
Paroli modifies the regular 7-on-7 rules to better help him teach his players. And most area coaches said that can be the biggest problem with the drill - when teams forget it is a teaching tool for the fall and focus too hard on winning during the summer.
Paroli said he's even heard stories of teams that were competing so hard that fights broke out.
"That's ridiculous," he said. "That's the coach's responsibility to make sure that doesn't happen by making sure you treat it like a practice, or we don't do it again."
Bailey agrees that 7-on-7 works best when team's don't worry too much about the summer outcome.
"Too many times in this setting you'll see people putting in a 7-on-7 type offense," he said. "They're trying to win and putting in patterns and defenses they wouldn't use on Friday night.
"We're definitely not keeping score and we're not worried about the score. Like one of my coaches said, we'll worry about that when they start giving out championships for 7-on-7."
Scholastic sports editor Earl Vaughan Jr. can be reached at vaughane@fayobserver.com or 486-3519.