Disciplined approach serves Spencer well

Spencer faces Dawson County in second round of Class AAA state playoffs

By DAVID MITCHELL

dmitchell@ledger-enquirer.com

It's Tuesday afternoon and the Spencer football team is warming up on its practice field. One voice can be heard shouting to an otherwise silent and obedient crowd.

"Down!" he yells.

The players reach toward their toes and count "one, two, three, four" in unison. The voice gives another command, and the crowd obeys.

A player strolls down the hill a little late, and the voice shouts out to him.

"Get a lap!" it says.

The player takes off around the field without protest. The group of players begins to run sprints toward midfield.

Not a single coach is in sight.

First-year coach Pierre Coffey walks down to the

field a short time later, just a few minutes after his assistant coaches have arrived. He had something to attend to before he got to practice, but the team didn't miss a beat. The players are loose and in their position groups, now led by the rest of the staff after taking cues from one of the seniors on the team.

It's a tight ship. One that has turned the Greenwave from cellar-dweller to title-chaser in just a year's time.

"We put a lot of emphasis on discipline from the beginning," Coffey said.

"A disciplined team beats an athletic team every day, in my opinion. We stressed that from the very beginning."

After topping Washington County in the first round of the Class AAA playoffs for their first playoff victory since desegregation, the Greenwave were preparing for a second-round matchup with Dawson County in Dawsonville on Friday night.

Like Spencer, Dawson County is 8-3. Unlike Spencer, Dawson County gets the benefit of home games early in the playoffs after earning the top seed out of Region 7-AAA.

But neither Coffey nor his players are worried too much about going on the road. Coffey called them "road warriors," which they'll have to be if they want to continue to win in the playoffs. He said his group is prepared for the challenge because it has, indeed, grown into a strong team, something that can be forgotten amongst the hoopla of accomplishing a winning season and making the playoffs.

"That was our goal," Coffey said. "Having a winning season and making the playoffs. But goals change. We said, hey, we're good enough to get in the playoffs, let's have the mindset that we're good enough to go try to win it all."

Spencer has won seven straight football games. After starting 1-3 during a difficult stretch against Carver, Northside, Peach County and Central-Macon, the Greenwave has beaten teams like Jackson, Westside-Macon and Washington County to get to the point they're at.

The players certainly think they're good enough to keep it going. Senior running back Tyrell Smith said he knew it early on.

"I knew we had a chance from the jump," he said. "From the beginning, I knew we had a chance. The chemistry, we knew we had that connection."

Junior quarterback Khalil Thomas said his team had a chance to do more.

"We're not finished," he said. "We want to keep going."

At the start of practice, before the coaches had arrived, the players finished their warmup and huddled together.

A player spoke to the team. At the end, they put their hands together and said one word:

Championship.

It's still four wins away, but Coffey has his players believing its possible.

"The main thing is just keeping the kids grounded," he said.

"We believe we can keep winning, but we're just taking it one week at a time. We're approaching Dawson County the same way we approached Washington County."

This story was originally published November 18, 2015 at 10:23 PM with the headline "Disciplined approach serves Spencer well ."