If there’s any positive to take from Strawberry Crest’s 2014 season, it’s that the team has nowhere to go but up.
The Chargers went into the season expecting things to be at least a little different from 2013, when the team came a quarter shy of making the playoffs. But it probably wasn’t expecting to go 1-9. That’s what happens when a team’s core is made up almost entirely of senior talent, which then graduates en masse.
Things certainly could have been worse for Strawberry Crest, though. The team could easily have finished at 4-6 had a few plays gone their way in non-district games: it lost to Bloomingdale, Spoto and Freedom by a combined total of 17 points. And it did pick up a 9-6 win over Brandon in mid-September, which was ultimately what gave both Durant and Plant City a shot to play for the playoffs (and, in the Cougars’ case, the district title) at the end of the season. Hopefully, fans of those teams have already thanked the Crest fans in their lives for that assist.
However, even if those three games did go the Chargers’ way, little would have changed. The Chargers got wrecked in the other three district games, losing by a combined total of 65 points and scoring 30. They also gave up 48 points apiece to a 3-8 Leon team and a 2-9 Riverview team, though they do get cut a break for the 42-0 home loss to Armwood; the Hawks could have blown out any team in the district by the end of the season.
Offensively, the brightest spot on this team was in the backfield. Senior running back Arjay Smith finished with 727 rushing yards and nine total touchdowns (including all eight of the team’s rushing scores), and was often the spark that kept Crest in games. Bryce Blackmon, who has been named the starter for 2015, had the second-highest totals on the team with 58 yards on seven touches.
It wasn’t the season quarterback Tristan Hyde and top wideout Clay Cullins, then seniors, had hoped for, however. Hyde finished with five touchdown passes against 13 interceptions, totaling 1,274 passing yards and a 48% completion rate. Cullins was reliable when the ball was thrown his way, making 46 catches for 386 yards and three touchdowns.
Defensively, Jordan Zilbar stood out from the pack with a 93-tackle season (48 assisted). Possibly the only thing stopping him from breaking Matt Chaney’s school record of 124 tackles was the fact that Zilbar had to play several positions to make up for injured players. This includes some time as a defensive back, a position that doesn’t set anyone up to crack 100 tackles.
“I fully expect Zilbar to challenge for that record this year,” head coach John Kelly says. “He’s just all over the field. Great competitor.”
COMING UP
Kelly and the coaching staff are hoping that both units took 2014 as a learning experience. So far, they say, it looks as though things are trending upward with these Chargers.
Although Crest did lose several impact players to graduation, such as Hyde, Cullins, Smith and top cover man Josh Engram, most of the team will be back in action. The versatile Blackmon twins, Bryce and Chase, will be asked to shore up the running back and linebacker positions, perhaps even playing some DB. Senior wideout Anthony Quinn, who averaged 10 yards per catch last season, will lead the young receiving corps. Zilbar is widely expected to break Chaney’s record in 2015 and, if everything goes according to plan, play his natural linebacker position all season.
But one of the players that’s getting the most buzz is starting quarterback Tate Whatley. Local fans will remember Whatley from his time with the Plant City Dolphins two years ago, and the sophomore has only gotten better. Otherwise, he wouldn’t already have a scholarship offer from Mercer before starting the 10th grade.
“That’s a kid where the sky is the limit, no lie,” Kelly says. “But it’s more than just on the field with that kid: he’s a hard worker in the weight room, he’s a great student in the classroom, he’s a great character, integrity-type example for what we want to personify here at Strawberry Crest.”
Whatley won’t have an arsenal like Plant City’s to work with at the moment, but he’ll still be expected to perform at a high level for the next three seasons. Helping Whatley even further is the fact that a couple of his targets, tight end Austin Eldridge and wideout Chase Lawson, were teammates of his from those Dolphins days.
“He’s gonna break probably every record that we have here at Strawberry Crest, from the quarterback position,” Kelly says.
Across the board, it certainly looks like this Crest team could be better than the 2014 squad. Although defensive coordinator Carey McCray left the position and the state of Florida, new DC Marcus Governor brings familiarity with Durant and Plant City (where he’s previously worked) to the 4-2-5 scheme Kelly plans to run with. That scheme is a natural fit for Crest’s young athletes, according to the coach.
“The most competitive group is our linebackers,” Kelly says. “We’re going with a 4-2-5 look, so we’ve got a lot of outside linebacker, DB-type bodies with the overhang-type players. It’s been really competitive at that group, and we’ve got a lot of those type of bodies at this school.”
“We’re gonna adapt, like we always do,” Kelly says. “It doesn’t matter who we’re playing, whether it’s a team that hasn’t won a game or an undefeated team. We’re gonna come out with the same mentality. It’s been that way ever since I took over as head coach at Strawberry Crest.”
Of course, improving in 2015 won’t be easy. While the Chargers do appear to have at least one “gimme” game on the schedule (Middleton, which didn’t win a single game last season), the addition of Lennard, Bloomingdale and Tampa Bay Tech makes things a lot more complicated. The last seven weeks of the schedule, which include six consecutive district games, would be one heck of a grind for any team.
Does Crest have the maturity, and perhaps the secret weapons, to carve out a name for itself this year?