AKRON - In the words of fifth-year Tippecanoe Valley coach Jeff Shriver, football is a demanding, tough sport.
Shriver will find out soon enough if his players are up for the challenge."Football is a demanding, tough sport," said Shriver, whose team is looking for the program's first winning season since an 8-2 record in 2007. Not only do you have to battle your opponent, but also yourself. We've got to be both physically and mentally tough. Our numbers are down, so we're going to play ironman football at times and we're going to have to be in great shape. Conditioning will be a big factor, be we don't have a lot of room for substitutions."
Including grades 9-12, Valley has 52 players on its 2010 roster - nine seniors, 14 juniors, 9 sophomores and 20 freshman.
"We knew we'd have a small senior class," said Shriver, whose Vikings were 5-5 a year ago. "This clas was oh-fer in seventh grade and oh-fer in 8th grade. The sophomore class is also small. Our enrollment is down at Tippecanoe Valley High School, and we just don't have as many kids out for football. The junior class has been pretty consistent. The numbers there are right where we anticipated. That group went undefeated and unscored on when they were freshmen. That's a group we've been excited about."
Graduated from last year's offense is playmaker Michael Lewis.
Lewis was fifth in the Three Rivers Conference and led the Vikings with 682 rushing yards.
He also led Valley in receiving with nine catches for 125 yards.
The Vikings do, however return four players who carried the ball at least 20 times last season in juniors Brody Andrews (52-295), Wade Cave (47-212), James Gregory (21-152) and senior Josh Doody (22-156).
Calling the signals will be senior quarterback Gus Lukens, while sophomores Mason Teel, Dan Miller and Justin Gunter and junior Shelton Carpenter will also be skilled position players on the offensive side of the ball.
"We've got some offensive people that I think can do some good things," said Shriver.
Defensively, Shriver said his corps of linebackers will be a team strength.
Getting time at outside linebacker will be seniors Isaac Yoder, Rob Hoffman and Lukens and sophomore Dayton Cohagen.
Playing inside linebacker will be juniors Trent Bauters and Cave and senior Tyler Akers.
"Our linebacking corps is a talented group," said Shriver. "They're going to have to be very physical and fly to the ball if we're going to shut teams down."
Valley opens the season Friday at 7:30 p.m. by hosting Culver Military Academy.
After a game at Bremen on Aug. 27, the Vikings open TRC play by hosting Manchester on Sep. 3.
