When it comes to the increasingly popular 7v7 passing camps in which high school teams spend the summer competing, it’s usually a showcase for skills players — the quarterbacks, receivers and defensive backs.
Those who toil along the offensive and defensive lines usually do so in obscurity during games and even more so during these summer games, where they’re relegated to the weight room or back field or even the parking lot.
But it can be a chance for that unit to bond, new Española Valley High School coach Caleb Holbrook said after the Sundevils competed in the Santa Fe Indian School event on Saturday along with Pojoaque Valley.
“I needed to give them an opportunity to realize they’ve progressed and will continue to progress under the coaching and hard work we put in together,” he said in a text message. “The (offensive linemen) who competed were freshmen/sophomores who have no varsity experience. This installed confidence in the rebuild of my offensive line. They’re excited to get back to work, and believe in their potential.”
Sundevils sophomore lineman Nicholas Martinez said it was a good experience.
“It feels great that we’re actually having fun,” he said. “Especially since my freshman year, I didn’t get to experience these types of things.”
The linemen showed off their weight-lifting prowess, flipped tires up and down a field, shoved a five-man blocking sled around the field, toted dumbbells in a farmer’s walk exercise and pushed a truck (well, actually a Dodge Durango because the truck didn’t show up) around the parking lot.
The latter was a favorite, Martinez said.
“It was a great one, three men pushing the truck,” he said. “We did it twice, and then we did it an extra time because it was fun. It all inspires us, especially our O-line, to work harder, to be as great as the O-line was last year or be even greater.”
The Sundevils heavies ended up taking second in the event to Cobre after losing a tie-breaking sumo wrestling contest they had never done before.
And the Elks won the passing title, overcoming a loss to Española in bracket play to beat the Sundevils in the knockout round, then handily beat Capital High School in the championship game.
“This is my third year and it’s different,” Elks coach Zeke Villegas said. “I feel like we’re so much more ahead this year than the last two years. We can do a lot more, different things. We’re able to run a little bit more things on defense. Depending on how they line up, we’re able to change coverages right before the ball is snapped. We’re reading offenses and route running a lot better. Our quarterback (Josh Gonzales) is in his third year in the system and he’s making a lot better reads.”
These types of camps give coaches the opportunity to get the backups and younger players experience to get them ready for more varsity minutes, he said.
“It also gives us a chance to see what our (second- and third-string players) can do,” Villegas said. “We’ve been able to see a lot from them. That’s what these passing camps do for you, get reps for the guys that need them.”
Holbrook said it was good to see how his skill players looked, but there were some lessons learned that he hopes will pay dividends down the road.
“I wanted to see how my skills reacted to teams from a lower class of play,” he said. “We handled business in the morning, then became complacent once we believed these teams couldn’t compete. That resulted in us losing in the divisional from a go-ahead score in the final seconds, which eliminated us from the championship game. Complacent mindsets, and not finishing games are the two discrepancies that we as a team will fix.”