Burnet football ready for Lago Vista
CAPTION: Burnet senior quarterback Charles Edwards (1) and his offensive line include senior Noah Pirie are ready to start the season. Photo by Martelle Luedecke/Luedecke Photography
The Burnet High School football team is in the midst of game week preparations to travel to play the Lago Vista Vikings at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 29, at the Lago Vista High School Stadium.
The Vikings feature second-year starter Tripp Henderson at quarterback. He has completed 82 of 176 passes for 1,164 yards and 10 touchdowns and has 51 carries for 163 yards and three scores.
His top targets also return. Senior receivers Brock Morton had 11 catches for 407 yards and four touchdowns and Matthew Purkey had 24 catches for 369 yards and three scores.
Also returning is senior running back Noah Arambula, who had 184 rushes for 1,221 yards and 12 touchdowns last season.
Last season Lago Vista went 9-4 overall, 4-2 in District 13-4A Division II with eventual state semifinalist Wimberley winning the district crown. The Vikings’ season ended in a 35-0 loss to Sinton in the regional finals.
“They’re athletic,” Burnet head coach Ben Speer said. “They like to run some power run stuff they do well. Their quarterback is a scrambler. He does well.”
Defensively, the Vikings linebackers “are physical,” Speer said.
But Lago Vista could have been 8-5 had the ball bounced differently in the 23-20 outcome against the Bulldogs last season. Instead, Burnet, which was leading 20-17 midway through the fourth quarter turned the ball over on downs as the Bulldogs were running out the clock.
A deep throw by the Vikings allowed the drive to continue with three minutes left when the Burnet secondary, which featured brand new starters to the varsity level, were unable to knock the ball down.
In addition Lago Vista had a turnover the Vikings were quicker to get to than the Bulldogs.
The Bulldogs now have experience in the secondary, which is considered the strength of the that unit. They still want to pursue the ball with relentless abandon. And in this season opener, Speer said he wants the offense to take the field first.
“I want to get some momentum coming out,” he said. “In both scrimmages, we’ve started on defense. We want to get confidence in ourselves that we can do this, and we’ll be just fine.”
Burnet is entering this contest after traveling to Waco Robinson for a scrimmage Aug. 21.
The scrimmage featured eight-minute segments where each team’s offense and defense played. Then they played a live quarter. Thunderstorms and lightning caused a little delay, Speer said.
The Rockets’ quarterback is junior Brice McCurdy, who is generating a lot of interest from college programs.
“They’re big and physical,” Speer said. “They have a fast Division I quarterback and another good running back. They’re a good team. He’s just a great athlete. I think he definitely has lots of tools, has great touch on the deep ball, and reads things well. He’s a great kid who has all the tools.”
Offensively, the Bulldogs didn’t score.
“We moved the ball,” Speer said. “On our most successful drive, we got to the five and fumbled.”
For him, the emphasis is more about the Bulldogs focusing on what they can control: how they perform and each player doing his job on every play.
“Sometimes we get caught up in looking and forgetting to do other things,” the coach said. “Do your basic stuff. Our boys understand that we may not always be the best team, but we can play our best. We’ve seen it. We didn’t play our best game. We have to do better.”
While no Bulldog liked the outcome of the scrimmage, Speer indicated he and his staff used it as an opportunity to teach.
“I would have liked to have seen us compete better – that’s on us as coaches and partly on the kids,” he said. “They have to believe. I told them we’re not always going to be the biggest or the fastest. You guys have to get over that. We have to do some other things like execute and give great effort. I don’t think we had that last Thursday. It was a good wake-up call for us.”
