THOUGHTS FROM THE STATE TOURNAMENT AND ON THE SEASON

The State Tournament Board of Directors tries to put teams from around the state in each pool to provide the players a chance to compete against teams that they might not normally see in competition 7 on 7 or in football. It is a "random" drawing so some years the pool is more competitive than others recognizing that ALL of the teams where good enough to qualify along the way. It is important to recognize that just "getting there" is a real accomplishment. Teams like Southlake, Austin Westlake and Arlington's own Martin and Bowie high schools tried but did not succeed in qualifying this season. This year Lamar was placed in a pool with San Antonio Oconnor (SA area), Hutto (Austin Area) and Manvel (Houston area). All three of these teams had a player that was selected as the Pre-Season District POY on either offense or defense. There were a number of Division 1 recruits on these teams, particularly on the Manvel team. So we knew we had our work cut out for us! 

We played about as well as we can play for the first half of the Hutto game opening up a 34-13 lead. They fought back and made it closer but we stayed ahead the whole game. In the 2nd game against SAC we played a complete game and won by 17. So going into the 3rd game 2-0 we knew we had accomplished our goal of making it into the championship bracket on Saturday as we could finish no worse than 2-1 or 2nd in the pool. Whether it was that knowledge or the heat or a combination thereof we "ran out of gas" in the Manvel game and were beaten pretty soundly. Still 2-1 in this pool was a good day's work!

To give you some further evidence of the talent we played against Friday, on Saturday Hutto and SAC played in the consolation bracket tournament. In many ways this is a hard thing to do because you are really playing for pride as you cannot win the 7 on 7 state championship. This 32 team tournament requires winning 4 games in a row on Saturday to get to the finals. Well guess who wins 4 games each? That's right Hutto beat SAC in the consolation finals! What this tells me is those kids are mentally tough and have a lot of pride. Our first game on Saturday was against Waxahatchie. We beat them 28-26 to qualify earlier in the year so we knew they were a very good team. They played at another level during the state tournament, beating us and three more excellent teams to reach the State Finals. They lost a heartbreaker, going for two points at the end and missing to lose to Lake Travis by one point. So literally 3 of the teams we played last week made it to the final 4 spots!

Although going out early on Saturday is tough it does help to know you were playing and competing against other quality teams. The 2017 edition of the Viking 7 on 7 had an outstanding year finishing 17-6. They competed hard; love each other and are willing to make the sacrifices necessary to be a good team in the summer and now I am sure they will do the same in the fall. 

Super job again this season by our assistant coaches all of whom were Vikings.

THANKS FOR THE OPPORTUNITY TO BE YOUR COACHES AND CONGRATS AGAIN ON JOINING THE "ALWAYS QUALIFIED CLUB"  VFND AND "20/20"
Jim Poynter   

STATE CHAMPIONSHIP WEEK

After several months of practices and competing in 6 state qualifying events the 15-4 Vikings are now preparing for our road trip to College Station. This is the 20th year of the Texas State 7 on 7 Championship and as everyone knows this is our 20th straight appearance.

What is not as well known is our record in advancing from 4-team pool play on Friday to the Championship Bracket (round of 32) on Saturday over that period of time. Only 3 times in 19 years have the Vikes failed to advance to the championship bracket. That means we either finished 1st or 2nd in pool play 16/19 seasons! All of the teams that make it to College Station are talented so this record of advancing 84% of the time truly shows Viking excellence over time.

We have our work cut out for us in our Pool "draw" this year. As we always preach to the kids though, it is mostly about how we perform. If we play as we are capable of there is no reason this group cannot make it 17/20. It is a tough 3 game stretch in the peak heat of the day on Friday every year. We believe that our preparation (19 games in the regular season) and our practice preparation this week will give us a chance to compete at our best. 

RECAP OF 6TH AND FINAL SQT OF 2017

On a very hot/muggy Friday the Vikes went to Rowlett HS and took care of business winning all three pool games. Several items of note from yesterday:

• Continued to play aggressive on defense. Had several interceptions including another pick 6 by Deshawn Gaddie. I don't know what our season record for pick 6's is by I am pretty certain DG owns it by now. We got our hands on a lot of other balls that we need to reel in next week at State.
• Spread the ball around nicely on offense today. We have a deep receiver corps and it puts stress on other teams to figure us out as we can throw it to anyone at any time.
• Had a tremendous come from behind OT win over a very athletic Mesquite North team. We showed great poise as we were behind the whole game and we made the plays that had to be made to win.

We had a great "moment" today bonding with a team from deep south Texas. Rather than repeating the story here please go to our lamar Vikings 7on7 FB page; its worth the read...

For the regular season we went 15-4. No team played in more SQT games this year as we played in the maximum number allowed. This amount of competition will hopefully serve us well next week. We will have our state pool games announced Sunday evening and I will post them here. Attached is a picture with most of our senior players after the tournament (two others were taking care of summer school and so we will need to shoot another picture with them too). Great job guys!

SQT #5 -THE WORK CONTINUES...

Last Saturday the Vikes went back to Pennington Field in Bedford for the 2nd time this season and for the second time went 2-1 in pool play. As part of our preparations for State we continued to use all 20 players including rotating our QB's so as to get playing time for everyone and a look at different combinations of players on offense and defense.

This continues to be a "ball hawking" group on Defense. While we had a number of actual interceptions, we can very close to DOUBLING that number with other balls we should have caught. In game #1 against Rockwall Heath we had two int's, one by Califah Garr and a "pick six" by Jaylen Nobles. In Game # 2 James Douglas, Jaylen Nobles, Joe Vaughn and Jack Dawson each had a pick. Four interceptions in a game is outstanding and we averaged two per game.

Offensively we struggled at times and at other times played well. The energy by our receivers was good in all three games. We forced too many throws into coverage and will have to eliminate our own interceptions before the state tournament. Our percentage of extra points completed is still not where it needs to be.

We averaged 29 points per game on offense which is about 14 points below where we need to be. Defensively we allowed just 53 points in total or 18 points per game. We need to hold teams below 28 ppg to be successful at the State Tournament. Our record for the season is 12-4.

We play on FRIDAY this week at the Rowlett SQT. We will continue to rotate players through Friday. We will practice twice next week prior to departing for College Station. These will be two important practices as we finalize our preparations for State.

VIKINGS COMPETE IN SQT NO. 4 LAST SATURDAY-SOME THOUGHTS

NORTHWEST SQT RESULTS

Game 1:  Lamar 28    Lake Dallas 35
Game 2:  Lamar 45    Joshua 12
Game 3:  Lamar 48    Brewer 47 (OT)

Viking Season:  10-3

On a windy day at Eaton HS the Vikes got some good work in and we coaches learned some things particuarly about some of our younger players. Once a team is qualified for the State Tournament (which we did at the 2nd SQT) there is a natural tendency to "left off the gas". The 7 on 7 coaches work very hard to make the players understand that as a team we are paying $300 per tournament to get real games against other teams with refs and travel for a reason. That reason is to get better and hopefully peak right around the end of June for the State Tournament (6/30-7/1).

These extra tournaments post qualifying give us a chance to look at different players in different combinations so we can find the right mix for the state tournament. After Saturday, in consultation with Coach DeLay and his staff, we have selected the final 20 team members for State (subject of course to injury or other factors). The hard part for us as coaches is that every year getting to 20 (state rule) means we must leave 1-4 players off that roster that have contributed and are capable of playing at the varsity level. We will encourage those players to keep coming to practice AND to try to help the Viking JV team get qualified for the "Prime Time" state tournament. We will now take those 20 players to the final two SQT's so we get used to playing as units and playing fast. Our next tournament is in HEB this Saturday (6/17) and I will post on the web site front page under the PDF tab the specifics as soon as it is released.

Kids are working hard and we are getting better. The next two weeks are key to our growth as a team. NEED EVERYONE AT PRACTICE THE NEXT TWO TUESDAYS AT 6:30 PM AT CRAVENS. TEAM PICTURE IS THIS TUESDAY AT 6:30 PM.

VFND!
Jim Poynter

PREPARING FOR THE POST SEASON

Last Saturday (6/3) we participated in our 3rd State Qualifying Tournament of the Season. It was a rainy, cool morning and we were thankful to be on field turf at Pennington Field instead of real grass (mud).

Our objective going into this tournament was to get a good look under game conditions at some of our younger players on both sides of the ball. Although the Vikes want to win every time we compete, getting reps for these players trumped final score. Having said that we finished 2-1 which runs our season record to 8-2.

In our upcoming 4/6 SQT's this Saturday (6/10) we begin to focus on the 20 players we believe to be likely to make our State roster. Believe it or not, we have just FIVE PRACTICES remaining until we travel to College Station. So these 3 SQT's and 5 practices will determine in large part how successful we will be this season. We will begin to set lineups and play with more speed and recognition as we grow accustomed to playing together. IT IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT THAT THE PLAYERS GET TO EVERY PRACTICE THE REST OF THE WAY. The practice/tournament schedule is attached as a PDF to the web site.

 VFND AND "20/20",

Coach Poynter

VIKINGS SECURE STATE CHAMPIONSHIP BIRTH AT GRAPEVINE SQT

On a truly hot and muggy Saturday the Viking players rolled to a 4-0 record and it was NOT EASY.
We were not as sharp on either side of the ball this week as we were in Frisco and there were two primary factor:  1. We were less than 48 hours removed from the spring football scrimmage and 2. The weather (hot and windy). While we got through spring football with just a couple of injuries (Sam and Elijah) the players bodies were still recovering from contact and the spring game. Even though we were physically more tired this week the kids did not use that as an excuse and played hard and with a lot of enthusiasm. We came from behind to win games 3 and 4 which showed a lot of character. There is real pressure for any Viking 7 on 7 team to get qualified with a streak this long. NO ONE WANTS TO BE REMEMBERED AS THE TEAM THAT DID NOT "GET IT DONE". We talk about it frankly right from the first practice of the season. Still it is always a big relief for all of us when it is "done" for another year. SO CONGRATS TO THE 2017 TEAM-THEY HAVE JOINED THE "CLUB"!

We now have time to work on a number of things in practice and in the 4 remaining tournaments. We will play different player groups at times as we try to determine who will be on the final roster for State. We will not make that determination for at least a few weeks. ONE THING FOR SURE IS WE CANNOT COMPETE AT STATE PLAYING THE SAME 7-8 PLAYERS ON OFFENSE AND DEFENSE AS WE DID THE FIRST FEW WEEKS. We now MUST develop 20 players who can play and contribute because will play up to 8 games in two days against very good teams in very hot weather. So rotating players is a must. I have said this for years the teams that go deep have 20 players not just a roster of 20. 

Now the work begins to identify those players and our rotations.

VFND AND "20/20"

Jim Poynter

5/22/17

Very solid start to the varsity 7 on 7 season this past Saturday at the first state qualifier of the year. While we just missed winning our pool and moving on to the qualifying round there were a number of very positive signs that this can be a very good Viking team.

Scores:

Lamar 55  Frisco Reedy 13
Lamar 42 Lake Dallas 6
Plano 39 Lamar 26

• Defense allowed just 19 points per game; in just three games we had 7 interceptions; two were returned for TD's (pick 6). Two more came really close to going back for scores. THAT IS OUTSTANDING WORK.
• Offense averaged 43 points per game. Only twice in three games did we turn the ball over on downs or interception which means we were making good decisions and then executing the plays. On all important extra points we made 14-17 which is an excellent conversion ratio. Our starting receivers caught, 23, 18, 17, 12 and 5 passes each for the day which is great ball distribution.

Our "secret sauce" is to score consistently and then get two "stops" on D per half.  We came very close to meeting that challenge Saturday. The energy and effort was good all day. I really like the way we fought back from being behind twice in the 3rd game to tie the score. We will need to learn to win from behind and we will.

 All in all a very good first tournament.

Coach Poynter
VFND
"20/20"

4/20/17

By this Saturday we will have 5 preseason practices under our belt and it is a good thing as our first state qualifier has been moved up to Saturday 4/29.

The host school Frisco Heritage, has worked out a deal with the Dallas Cowboys so the 24 team tournament can be held at the "Star", the Cowboys new HQ and practice facility in Frisco. Not only will this be an opportunity for all of us to tour the new facility but the kids get to play there. It is also NFL Draft weekend so there will be lots of media about the premises as well.

We do not have a lot of details just yet but they will be forthcoming early next week so stay tuned!

We have made good progress as a team over the last month. It is a challenge for the kids and coaches a like as we see them only once per week right now and many have "in season" sports along with school to fit in the rest of the week. So any practices in the preseason are beneficial and should make a difference over the course of the season. We will have a few kids miss the Frisco SQT because they have track or baseball conflicts. All 24 teams will be dealing with this and we will take the best 20 players we have available and see how it goes!

There is a special liability form for the Cowboys event so please fill it out and get it back in as soon as possible along with the season tournament fees.

Jim

“20/20”

The 2017 Edition of the Lamar Viking 7 on 7 Team will have the opportunity to “turn the page” to a state best 20 straight years of qualifying for the State 7 on 7 Championship with all 20 qualifications occurring “on the road”. None of the players on this years team were born when the streak began in 1998. 

2017 LAMAR 7 ON 7 VARSITY TOURNAMENT SCHEDULE 01-25-17


2017 MASTER Practice-Tournament Schedule Before End of School 02-10-17

2017 MASTER Practice-Tournament thru End of Season 02-18-17