At least for now, the burning of the early-morning oil has concluded for the Greyhounds.
Ahead of this past Tuesday’s J-Day Purple and White Scrimmage game, Jones County held all its spring practice sessions in early morning hours, starting at around 5:30 a.m. By the time each session wrapped up, the rest of the Jones County High School campus was emerging to life for a full day.
It’s a timing mechanism that the Greyhounds are using to help identify how each player can impact the roster ahead of the summer, both on the field and in the locker room.
“It gets guys up and pushes them to have to strain and focus,” Greyhounds head coach Justin Montgomery said.
“We’re still trying to figure out who’s going to be in the pack and who is going to be committed, and once we find that team, we’ll be ready to take that next step.”
Speaking of next steps, last week ended with a situational scrimmage on Friday morning. That included the quarterbacks playing without non-contact jerseys, enabling them to scramble against defenders and test their pocket presence against the Greyhounds’ defense.
“Week two was good.
We finished our eighth practice with a situational scrimmage,” Montgomery said. “We got some really good looks. Our quarterbacks were live that day, so we were able to see those guys under pressure,” Montgomery said.
“We’re really pleased with where we are. The fundamentals are still our focus right now and making sure where uphold our identity.”
So what does that identity look like so far?
“I’d like to say we’re physical. We’re really going to be ‘attention-to details’ and playing hard,” Montgomery said. “We have some really good weapons, and we’re still trying to figure out how exactly we use those this year. Right now, it’s (an identity of) hard-nosed football, it seems like.”
