By Fawn Byron
Last Friday, September 20th, the Lincoln High Varsity Football Team had the crowds going wild! The Links had their first win against Omaha Bryan with a score of 34-12! Way to go Links! Links started out slow but made an amazing comeback in the second half of the game. “ I was very happy that we got the win. “ Says Macke, coach of the Varsity team. “ Although, I thought we could of played better. “
On August 30, our first game against Omaha Northwest was a loss. Even though we suffered from a loss, our links team still made the game great! On September 6 we suffered an even greater loss against Southeast. Even with those losses, Coach Macke wants the players attitude, when they leave 8th period that their minds are on the football field. Nowhere else. One of the problems we face is we lost a lot of Seniors last year and gained a lot more sophomores to play for Varsity. “ Which can be good and bad, “ Says Macke. “ Good because it helps the younger guys get experience for the next couple of years, but bad because we are playing teams that have seniors and more experienced players. Therefore they’re a little bit better than us in that aspect. That’s why by the end of the year, by each week, I expect the younger team to get better. “ Talking to Macke and asking him about goals he might have for the Varsity team, he replied that the goals are not measured by wins and loses, but the fact to not be a heavily penalized team and have a positive ratio of turnovers is the goal. And have all the players show up to practice everyday.
Also talking to him about the things he wanted to change from last year he told me he wants to play a cleaner game and have less penalties. He also said that he wants them to be coachable. Even though it gets hectic out on the field, he wants his players to know that he always has their back and still wants to improve on their game. What Macke is expecting from the team is that his players make improvements each week in the way they practice and give effort. By week 9, Macke wants the team to be better than what they were in week 1. Macke’s feelings on the Varsity team is week one there was a lot of mistakes that cost them and in week two is was a much better team they played and he said in the second half they played much better in defense. Right now Lincoln High Varsity Football is playing with a lot of guys with no Varsity experience and it is a big jump to go from Freshmen or Reserved Football to a Varsity level. Macke had said the differences between this year and last year’s season is that they are running a new offence and defense. There are new coaches and they are just trying to get used to it all the newness and trying to get comfortable and familiar with it all, and to just continue raising expectations.
About the opponents we are soon to face and if they are tough, Macke tells me “ That for us they’re all tough, until we establish the way we want to go about things. We don’t really look at one opponent being tougher than the other, we’re just going to try to take one opponent at a time.” As of now Varsity coaches are playing 9 to 10 Sophomores that get regular playing time. There are only 6 actual seniors are out on the team. Therefore Coach has to play the younger guys. Right now there is a little over one third of younger players playing regularly in the games. When asking Macke what improvements he would like to see he replied, that he would like the effort to be better. Macke is focused on more of the little things for his team. One is to practice with more effort and practice with more energy. He says they find it harder to do that on Friday nights, if they don’t practice a certain way. He’s focused on having a good quality, efficient practices. If practices are upbeat and energetic, we feel that’ll translate into the games. If we don’t practice a certain way or if the players don’t come to practice, we feel they don’t get much out of it that Friday night. Hoping that the attitudes of the players are good, Coach Macke thinks they are still encouraged and still working hard. The kids want to do well, and Macke thinks deep down they want structure and discipline and that is what he is trying to provide for them.
