Bulldogs continue practicing

Garth Meyer, Whitman County Gazette | Oct 15, 20200

Garth Meyer | The Gazette count

Center Dustin Broeckel, guard Anthony Becker, tackle Grayson Riddell-Riggs and tight end Mason Gilchrist line up at the Colfax practice field Oct. 6. In the background are junior varsity linemen.

COLFAX –– Week 2 is underway for resumed football practice as the Bulldogs finish their allotted practice time, cut off in the summer after a surge of virus cases in Washington.

The practices are no-contact. This week something was added.

"The kids are in helmets and shoulder pads because they like the feel of it," said head coach Mike Morgan. "They just missed it."

When football season does arrive – moved to Feb. 17-May 7 in the WIAA four-season schedule for 2020-21 – the Bulldogs are expected to return 8-9 starters from the 2019 playoff team.

After a total of nine practices in June, of a maximum 20, Colfax returned to the fields Oct. 5.

The Bulldogs – which did not go to football camp as in a normal summer, counting as part of the 20 practices – will finish their allotment by the end of October, going three times per week, then two with film sessions.

So what's it been like back out there?

"For us, it's always been about part, part, part, whole," Morgan said, as the team practices in pods; receivers, quarterbacks, linemen, etc. "I don't need to run 11 guys against 11 right now. What we need is individual time."

Morgan, in his 22nd year as Colfax head coach, has not used the full 20 summer practices before in his career, in part to allow other coaches time with the same athletes.

This year, finishing the allotment by the end of the month will allow other sports to get in all of their "summer" workouts – in a window expanded last week by the WIAA to Dec. 19, to allow teams across the state to get in all of their time, for which many schools had less practices in over the summer than Colfax.

"It wasn't just football that got shorted practices," said Morgan.

Overall, the football coach indicated he and his assistants and the players are happy to be back at the process.

"It's October, doggone it, we should be having our seventh game coming up this weekend," Morgan said. "Just trying to give them a little semblance of normal. The kids are a little left out, they know some of those kids playing in Potlatch, Genesee, Coeur D'Alene. It is what it is, but we're not shoutin' at the rain."