Prep Football: Ready To Roll

The great unknown.

That's where Eldorado head coach Brandon Hampton is right now and not so much with his own Eagles, but his Week 1 opponent in Vienna-Goreville.

Part of that unknown is how Hampton and company will defend against Vienna-Goreville's signature single wing offense.

Aside from that, like many season opening opponents, Hampton doesn't know a lot about Vienna-Goreville and adds that a good portion of the scouting report stemmed from Week 9 film and what he had gathered from over the summer.

"The single wing offense is problematic because it's very tough to replicate in practice," Hampton said. "It's a very unique style of play and no one else in about a three hour radius runs anything like that. You also don't know what new wrinkle they might have and much like us, we have a new wrinkle or two, but everybody does."

The season opener for Eldorado will be a little bit different this year as they open up Saturday, giving Hampton an extra day of work to get in.

The Eagles finished 6-4 last season, falling to Johnston City in the Class 2A playoffs 28-20.

"Historically, that has been a game that has been very, very hot, but it looks right now like the weather is going to be in the mid-80's which is a real blessing for us."

The twist for Hampton heading into the opener has been allowing him to focus more on his team rather than the opposition, searching for the right recipe for his Eagles.

"We have an idea of where we need to be at come game time and there are some things we are really emphasizing this week that will help us be better, rather than focus on what Vienna-Goreville has done in the past, what they might do Saturday."

Brian Trambley is in his second season at Vienna-Goreville, going 0-9 last year, after replacing Mike Rude, who spent the first five year's of the program's existence going 21-27.

The single wing offense derived under Rude, as well as current Harrisburg head coach Al Way and it's what Trambley knows as an assistant under the two.

"It's a lot of double slot stuff he picked up when coach Way was down there. I figure that potentially what they will be doing offensively. Defensively, we got after them pretty good last year. Week 1 usually comes down to who makes the fewest mistakes, handles the football properly and can play penalty free."

Hampton looks at his pros and cons going into Saturday's season opener and maintains that his offense his ahead of the curve, particularly where his offensive line is at.

"You could see that in the scrimmage last Friday night. We were getting back to really coming off the ball and I'm not really sure if we came off the football as well a year ago as we are right now in the preseason. I think our running backs and quarterbacks have been how they fake and set one another up. In the preseason and in the scrimmage that was better than at any point in the 2014 season.

"Defensively, we have a lot of returners in the back end and secondary. I like how the shell of our defense can communicate and get us in the right defense."

On the flip side, substitution patters on defense are a main concern for Hampton, as well as, making sure his team is in the right spots when that transition happens.

The same can be said from offense to special teams.

"We just want to make sure we have the right guys out there and know who those guys are going to be."

Michael Dann covers prep and college sports for the Harrisburg Daily Register. Follow him on Twitter: @spydieshooter.