Phoenix get ready for some football

Newly united football team prepares for new season, new facilities


Mecklenburg County High School Phoenix football players have been hard at it ever since preseason voluntary workouts began as the team gets ready for the 2022 season and a new era of high school football in the county.

The guys were supposed to play their first game at the new Phoenix stadium Friday night before that plan was nixed due to the school not yet having a certificate of occupancy. The scrimmage game has been rescheduled for Thursday at 6 p.m. on the road at Dan River.

Phoenix head coach Kelvin Hutcheson said his players did a great job of coming together during voluntary preseason conditioning sessions and they have been having a good time as a group. He felt like the workouts were productive.

“That went really, really well,” Hutcheson said of the conditioning and skill sessions. “All the kids worked real hard. They came together as a team and they act like they’ve been around each other for years. You would have never known — it was like a team coming together from just walking in there.”

Hutcheson said he felt the kids learned a lot during the sessions and now it’s time to start transferring what they’ve learned to the playing field. Once that is ready.

“Yeah, I think they were productive without having the new facility at the time,” Hutcheson said. “We rotated from Bluestone to Park View during the spring and then as we got to the summer we settled in at Park View.

“And it was very productive; we had good turnouts. The kids came out and lifted weights; we went outside and did agility drills, and [so forth]. I think that time really helped us jell to a point where we are now in practice.”

As the Thursday scrimmage approaches with Dan River, Hutcheson said the game will help him gauge where the players are now in their development. Hutcheson mentioned the youth of the team, something a lot of high schools are experiencing as they work to build back pre-pandemic participation in sports programs.

With all the young players on the team — both varsity and jayvee — Hutcheson envisions a roster that the program and coaches can build upon for the future. Over 60 kids turned out for the first official day of practice last week.

“Well, we’re a really young team across the board,” Hutcheson said. “And just going into this first scrimmage it’s like a baseline of who we have, what the guys are going to do with the information we’ve been teaching them.

“Are they gonna respond well when it’s live against someone else? So that what we’re looking for as coaches, we know mistakes will be made, but we’re just looking for effort, hustle and being able to compete. That’s what we’re looking for in our guys.”

Hutcheson noted the athletic facilities and grounds at the new campus are nothing short of outstanding and beautiful. He mentioned not only the professionally designed football field with its artificial turf surface but the track and field facilities — which neither high school has had in recent years — and the various other athletic fields. Teams also can take advantage of practice fields, something new for Mecklenburg County sports.

Hutcheson said the new facilities will be some of the best in the state and region — not only for gameday action, but for training purposes.

“I know they are still finishing up the stadium with the bleachers and everything, but I know the finished product is going to be one of the best in the state and I know in this region from what we have,” Hutcheson said.

“The conditioning area, I really haven’t had an opportunity to see them come into place yet. But I know with some of the equipment we’re getting, we’re getting some state-of-the-art; the weight room equipment is brand new. So once the inside is done it’s really going to come together for us, I believe.”

Mecklenburg County High School is a Class-4 athletic program and competes in the Piedmont District and Region 4D.

 

 

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