Kat footballers putting in serious time in summer work
7/8/2010 9:18:00 AM | Football
By Cody Stark
Huntsville Item Assistant Sports Editor
Summer Session Two begins for Sam Houston students Friday but while classes are going on there is another summer session that a majority of Bearkat football players are holding on their own.
A large group of returning SHSU football players are spending the summer in Huntsville and working each day to get themselves in top shape for the coming season.
The Bearkats lost a number of seniors and new head coach Willie Fritz and his staff spent most of the time evaluating the returning players and trying to figure out who could step in and make an impact on the team this fall. The players who will take the field in August when it's time to report for the upcoming season are taking full advantage of the summer break to make sure they hit the ground running when the time is right.
With so much turnover on the roster and the coaching staff, it's hard for SHSU fans to be too optimistic about the upcoming campaign. Only 30 of 62 lettermen from the 2009 team are back with only two offensive starters returning. The summer football magazines have been unanimous in picking the Kats low in their preseason forecasts.
But for returning guys like defensive lineman Coty Gatewood, the will to prove any doubters wrong that this team can compete in 2010 has been the driving force this summer during individual workouts.
"That makes us just want to do better and prove them wrong," Gatewood said. "The stuff that we do now and the way we are pushed is like nothing we have ever been through. We won like four or five games last year, we can easily win more than that from what we are doing now."
The excitement the players have under the new coaching staff and all the changes Fritz has made has brought a different and refreshing attitude to the players. More guys have hung around longer this summer, hitting the weight room with strength and conditioning coach Kyle Speer.
"For the most part, the people that are here are the ones that can be here and some people have go home to work and that is OK," Gatewood added. "But the people that are here are dedicated to getting better and making this team better. There is a positive attitude and you can tell the guys have really taking a liking to coach Fritz and his no nonsense type of deal."
There are currently 52 returning players on the roster and the majority of those guys hung around for the first summer school session, which ends this week. Fritz said that almost all of those players will be on campus for the second summer session.
As if that wasn't a good enough sign that this team was taking things serious, some of the incoming recruits have began showing up which is huge for the program considering that quite a few of those guys are going to be asked to step in and make an immediate impact.
"We have maybe 15 or 20 newcomers that are going to be here for the second session," Fritz said. "We told as many of those as we could to be here in the summer. This isn't high school, so we aren't going to wait for them to get into shape. We told them that if they planned on playing next year, they would have to be in football shape on day one.
"When I recruited them I told them that freshmen would play next year and the determining factor would be reporting to camp in shape. That goes for all of our guys," the coach added. "If you don't train like our guys are training this summer, you are going to be so far behind, just trying to survive practice instead of getting better. During spring practice, you coach to the lowest common denominator, in the fall, you coach to the highest common denominator, so you can't be behind."
The Bearkats start fall practice on Aug. 6 to begin getting ready for the season opener against Baylor on Sept. 4 in Waco at 6 p.m.
Sam Houston will open its 2010 home schedule with the annual Parents' Weekend game against Gardner-Webb on September 25. Homecoming is October 16 against Southeastern Louisiana.
The highlight of the season will be the Battle of the Piney Woods contest with Stephen F. Austin in Reliant Stadium in Houston on October 23.
Purchase Bearkat football tickets online at www.gobearkats.com. Fans also may purchase tickets at the Bearkat Athletic Ticket Office located in the Ron Mafrige Field House at Bowers Stadium or by calling the ticket office at (936) 294-1729.
