BENTONVILLE -- It is completely normal for a football coach to see wide eyes from his newest players when spring drills began, and Bryan Pratt saw his fair share of them earlier this month.
The only difference was the looks he saw came from the older players. They will be the juniors on Bentonville West's first football team next fall, and the series of spring workouts marked their next step in making the transition from Tigers to Wolverines.
"The speed of the game was something they had to get used to, with us being no-huddle," Pratt said. "And it's full go all the time. We try to get as many reps as possible and coach during film. There's not a lot of stopping and talking as we're getting rep after rep after rep.
"At first, it was a struggle, but now it's getting easier because the speed of the game has slowed down a little bit. They understand how we want to practice and what we want as their coaches."
West will have no seniors in its inaugural year, but Pratt is excited when about the numbers the program has drawn to this point. The Wolverines have about 70 players participating in spring drills, and there's another 67 players in next year's freshman class.
The sophomores had the upper hand early because they learned Pratt's system last fall as part of Bentonville Gold's ninth-grade team. The juniors, however, are getting more accustomed to the system and have made strides in learning the Wolverines' schemes.
"I like the new challenge, really," said junior Sebastian Caniglia, who split time between tailback and inside linebacker. "At first it was the sophomores leading the juniors. They had to teach us a little bit, but once we learned it we tried to teach them some things we knew about tackling, catching the football and other skills we have learned."
West had to hold practices at 6 a.m. each day this spring because it shared Tiger Stadium with Bentonville's team. Pratt said he would split his players as evenly as possible during the first seven practice sessions in order to give players as many opportunities as possible and evaluate the new players.
One of the biggest question marks was up front with the offensive and defensive lines. When the spring sessions ended Wednesday with a practice inside the Tiger Athletic Complex because of rain, Pratt believed his offensive line will consist of four juniors and one sophomore.
"That means one kid played for us last year and the others had only three weeks of practice with us," Pratt said. "That's a learning curve for us to get better, and I think we've done pretty good at doing that. Film has been huge for them to watch themselves and get coached on what they need to improve on each day."
The remaining practices were used to get West ready for its next step -- going against other competition. The Wolverines get their first chance next week when they go the Tulsa team camp and go against Oklahoma schools such as Union, Broken Arrow, Norman North and Edmond Memorial.
"It's been a big step and a new part of my life," said junior-to-be Jason Gloeckler, who will play free safety and wide receiver next fall. "I loved being a Tiger, but this is much more exciting. I can't wait to start a new program, build a new program and start new traditions for the new high school for years to come."
Sports on 05/28/2016