Englewood High School football players feel more confident after a Homecoming win 63-0 over the Littleton Lions. The team has a competitive season ahead of them, and many players say they aren’t taking time to celebrate and there is still a lot of work to be done.
The team is led by Quarterback Dylan Noll, “I’ve been playing flag football for many years.”
This year, he had no idea he was changing roles from tackle to QB, “Yeah, it was kind of bummer, because I was going to come back and play this year, preferably as a wide receiver, was the goal, and I know I was hoping to play with him and under the same coach, and a lot of the people, big opportunity, and then kind of everything got mixed up, and they needed room for new space, and I decided to fill that space,” Noll said.
Also, he has had to get comfortable with the new changes,“ It’s different but I love the new coaching staff and the new things worked out. So it was a lot at first. I felt a lot of pressure and stuff like that, but it’s filling the role, and I’m glad I have the opportunity,” Noll said.
But there have been some ups and downs to his new role, “Yeah I would say it was just a lot of learning, the steps and the formations, learning plays, stuff like that, being able to fit into an offense. I had played quarterback when I played flag football during recess. My dad had taught me to throw a football, so I definitely had enough fundamentals to be able to go out into the field. But every day, it’s still a learning process. It is not something I can just pick up over one summer, so just kind of had to work on learning the position itself first and then now adapting into perfecting it,” Noll said.
Now he has had to step up and be an important part of the team, “Hopefully next summer, I can get that down enough to really lead the team and kind of take into that position a lot more,” Noll said.
He speaks of the season so far, “I think we’re going to do great, and I think we’re going to be able to push through and be a strong team,” Noll said.
Head football coach Wade Auld is no stranger to the gridiron, “I’ve been coaching for 25 years and teaching for 25 years.”
He is pumped up for the season.“We have about 52 kids out, freshmen to seniors, and things are going extremely well,” Auld said.
This year is a fresh start for him and a bit challenging, “Being the new coach here and getting the kids to come out and play every day. We have great kids. So that hasn’t been a big challenge. Just the newness of it to me, dealing with everything, getting to know the kids, getting to know my assistant coaches. So the kids have a brand new coaching staff, and I have a brand new coaching staff, but it’s going extremely well,” Auld said.
Auld said this season is going to be a fun one, “Well, we won our first game, which was a big one, had a lot of success, and we’re tightening up the mistakes, so the kids are learning a brand new offense, brand new defense, so they’re doing extremely well,” Auld said.
Incoming Freshman wide receiver Michael Beulah has played the game for a few years, “I’ve been playing tackle football for three years.”
He sounds excited for the year so far and yet to come. “It’s looking good so far, I’m excited for the future,” Beulah said.
This year, he is swinging varsity and junior varsity, “It’s fun even though I don’t get that much time in varsity, I still do my best when I get in,” Beulah said.
He shows up when it’s time to shine, “I haven’t had a lot but the first game we were winning by a lot and the coach put me in and I did pretty good,” Beulah said.
