Published: October 10, 2008 12:08 pm            

On the sidelines with Coach Spadaro

PRINCETON — A failed Huntington Highlanders’ two-point conversion won the Princeton Tigers’ homecoming game for the home team, 28-27.

“Extra points were the difference in the game,” Tigers coach Ted Spadaro said. “One point — we made ours; they missed theirs.”

Spadaro noted the significance of the game, but said that the celebrations are mostly for students and alumni.

“It’s just another game for me, but for the community it’s homecoming,” Spadaro said. “They get to come home — the alumni — to watch us play, and we won. The kids had a victory dance over there afterwards. That’s good for them. Coaches can never relax.”

Spadaro praised his assistant coaches for their work in getting the 3-2 Tigers where they are this season.

“The offensive line did well this week, blocking, and we picked it up in the backfield,” Spadaro said. “The back began to run harder this week. Our special teams stepped up. They scored 10 points. Jerrell Powell scored on a 90-yard kickoff return.”

Powell is back from an injury-filled couple of weeks. Another Princeton player battling injuries will likely not play this week.

“Tevin Allen, I don’t think he’ll be ready this week,” Spadaro said. “He’s still nursing that ankle sprain real bad, and I’m not real sure if he’s going to be ready.”

Safety is a priority for Spadaro.

“I won’t play a kid if he’s hurt; I won’t do that.”

This week, Princeton plays one of the top-ranked teams in the state, George Washington. Spadaro is aware of the challenge awaiting his team.

“Going into this week’s game, we’re playing the biggest offensive and defensive line,” Spadaro said. “They average about 285-290 [pounds] across the front. They have height: 6 feet, 3, 4, and 5.”

Spadaro noted that George Washington has a lot of speed, and one of the best defenses in the state.

“They’ve got Jonathan Hudson — the Defensive Player of the Year last year — back at tackle,” Spadaro said. “So, he’s going to be a mainstay in their defense, create problems for you. They’ve got the quickest, skilled people that we’ll play all year long.”

When asked about the team’s strengths and weaknesses, Spadaro noted that he didn’t like to use the word “weakness,” and offered the following:

“Well, our strength right now, of course, is our offense,” Spadaro said. “We’re scoring a lot of points, but we’re giving up some defensive points that we shouldn’t. We should have had a couple of these scores that they scored against us; we should have intercepted those passes.”

An area he mentioned needs to improve is filling holes in his roster due to injury.

“Sometimes, when you have to fill in for players that are injured, sometimes the ones who fill in are not as experienced,” Spadaro said. “So, you have to go with what you’ve got. Sometimes it doesn’t look too good, but we’re working on it, we’re going to get better and we’re going to go down and play the best we can play.”

An issue Spadaro said he is working on is getting his players properly motivated.

“As a coach and ex-player, I didn’t have to be motivated,” Spadaro said. “I was always ready to play. It didn’t matter which side of the ball, when, where, or what. But, kids aren’t like that anymore.”

He said that different kids have to be motivated in different ways.

“Those positions where we’ve been a little bit thin have to be thick now,” Spadaro said. “It’s up to these kids to do that.”

Spadaro said that most of the kids are playing hard, but the ones not playing first team right now have to start picking it up and try to help out more than what they’re doing.

“They think that because they play [junior varsity] for five weeks that they’re just a “JV player,” and they lay back thinking that when they could be playing varsity,” Spadaro said. “It’s just up to them, what they want. They have to be ready to play, at all times.”

The Princeton Tigers play George Washington tonight on the road. They continue on the road, playing Capital Oct. 17, before heading back to Hunnicutt Stadium for two games, hosting Riverside and Greenbrier East. The final game of the season is on the road, against Nitro, Nov. 7.

        

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