Faith Academy faces an improved Killeen Memorial
MARBLE FALLS — A convincing 61-14 win against Killeen Memorial last year to start the season propelled the Faith Academy football team to a nine-game winning streak.
The Flames aim to do even better this year.
Head coach Russ Roberts said he looks for Killeen Memorial to be better this season.
The Warriors also will host the game on a new field, and Roberts believes the Aug. 26 contest will have an electric feel.
Last season, the Killeen Memorial junior varsity featured two players Roberts remembers.
“They had two eighth-graders who changed the game,” he said. “They have speed, quickness moves and are hard to tackle.”
The Flames, meanwhile, remain in the midst of a starting quarterback battle between junior Jake Diamond, sophomore Zach Haydon and freshman Hanner Shipley.
Roberts said Diamond won’t start against Killeen because he had to miss two practices. And the Flames are in a unique situation in that coaches have developed packages for each of the quarterbacks that plays to his strengths, he said.
Faith lost six players to graduation in May, so the Flames skipper said he looks forward to discovering new traits about this year’s team.
“I want to see if our talent level matches up well with what we did last year,” he said.
The Flames could have mercy-ruled the Warriors much earlier than the third quarter, but Roberts wanted each of his players to enter the contest.
Interestingly, the Warriors didn’t scrimmage an opponent in August, so game planning has been a challenge, he said.
“We couldn’t see our opponents last week,” he said. “We can’t call somebody and ask. When your first encounter with an opponent is an actual ball game, I feel like you’ve just handed us the first quarter.”