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Much to see and learn from Rebels scrimmage
08.15 echs football 1
Quarterback Dalton Couey and the Effingham County Rebels travel to Tattnall County Friday for a scrimmage. - photo by Photo by Pat Donahue

How much the Effingham County Rebels football coaching staff knows about their team will be less apparent Friday night than it will be over the succeeding couple of days.

The Rebels will meet the Tattnall County Warriors in a scrimmage tonight at 7:30 at Tattnall County High School. The outcome on the scoreboard holds little, if any, importance to Rebels head coach Jack Webb.

“We’re not really interested in what the score is in this thing,” he said. “We want to try to get better and hopefully see some good things in a game situation. We’re trying to find some people who can play.”

The Rebels and Warriors will play their varsity for the first two quarters before turning their younger kids loose in the third quarter. The varsity will return to action for the fourth quarter.

Those three quarters of action for the varsity group will allow the coaches to see on video who is ready to be a starter and who can be depended on to come off the bench.

“We’re going to look at the kids we feel like are our No. 1s right now,” Webb said. “We’ve go a bunch of open positions right now, and the kids need to get in there and compete for that spot.”

Even though the Rebels return six starters on defense, Webb said his defenders are still rather young and untested.

“Until they get that experience of Friday night and playing, we can’t do anything about that,” he said.

On offense, the Rebels coaches are trying to get the linemen to stay low through their blocks. They also have stressed hanging onto the ball for the backs.

“I tell them that’s a quick way to the sidelines in our offense,” Webb said.

By the time the scrimmage starts tonight, the Rebels, like so many other Georgia high school teams, will have had nine practices in full pads under their belts before going up against live competition.

The season opener is two weeks hence, and tonight’s scrimmage against Tattnall County is the only opportunity for the Rebels to test themselves against another team before the Aug. 29 opener at Burke County.

“We’re kind of anxious to see where we’re at and see where we need to go to be ready for Burke,” Webb said. “We’re making progress. We’re getting there. But we’ve got a long way to go.”