By Mac Banks and John Turner
Last year was one that the Catawba Ridge football team would like to forget.
Decimated by injuries, the Copperheads went 1-9 last season and missed the playoffs. This year is a new one and the Copperheads are looking forward to making the most of things.
“Being able to have your best players on the field is positive,” said Catawba Ridge head coach Zac Lendyak. “Being able to stay healthy that is every team’s goal. We have a ton of returners coming back now.”
Catawba Ridge has a new offensive coordinator in Mike Lewis, who has been on the staff for the past couple of seasons.
“The job of a good coaching staff is to tailor the offense and defense to the athletes we have and Mike has done a good job at doing that,” Lendyak said. “I think it will look a little different than it has in the past two or three years.”
Quarterback CJ Couch is back this year after missing the majority of last year with an ankle injury. His main targets will include Braylen Burgis and Brady Ambrose.
“Those are two seniors that have a ton of experience,” Lendyak said. “We feel really comfortable and confident in our wide receiving group. We feel really good there.”
Lendyak said as far as the running game, it will be more of a “running back by committee” approach to moving the ball.
On defense, Catawba Ridge is strongest with their defensive players like Alex Johnson and Connor McFadden, Lendyak said. At the linebacker’s position look for big things from Chase Elliott for the Copperheads. Lendyak pointed out other players like Josh Dobson, Darius Sutton, Ian Babcock, and Jaylen Cunningham on the defensive side of the ball that he expects big things out of.
“You will see a lot of different bodies out there,” Lendyak said.
When it comes to special teams, Catawba Ridge has been consistently good with their kickers. Camden Gifford returns as the Copperheads kicker and extra point mainstay.
“We have some pretty high expectations for what we can do special teams wise,” Lendyak added.
Catawba Ridge moves up to 5A this season and in doing so is now in the same region as local rivals Fort Mill and Nation Ford. Both Indian Land and Northwestern, who were in the Copperheads same region as 4A opponents, moves up with them.
“A lot of the region for us, there is some familiar area there,” Lendyak said. “It’s not going to be easy. The only team we haven’t ever seen is Rock Hill. We feel like we can compete with the best of them.”
Scheduling wise, Catawba Ridge will be seeing a lot of the same opponents, however, this time the games against teams like Fort Mill and Nation Ford will weigh a little more than just for bragging rights.
“Our non-region games kind of became our region games with Fort Mill and Nafo,” Lendyak said. “We get to play some teams we have never seen. It is fun for us to have a different schedule than we have had in recent years.”
Catawba Ridge opens the season at home Friday, Aug. 23 against Chapin. From there, they will have non-region games at East Gaston Aug. 30 and at Chester Sept. 6. They will host Spring Valley Sept. 13 before opening region play Sept. 20 at Fort Mill.
In region play, the Copperheads will host Northwestern Sept. 27, Nation Ford Oct. 18, and Clover Nov. 1. They will also travel Indian Land Oct. 18, and Rock Hill Oct. 25 as part of region play.
Mac Banks: mac@fortmillprepsports.com, @fortprep
