Changing the way a football team runs its offense is a big enough challenge in itself.
The Cortland Women’s Flag Football team had to do it without their starting quarterback.
During the first two weeks of the spring semester, junior Offensive Coordinator Brandon Munk and junior Offensive Assistant Harrison Sussman were trying to change the way they call plays.
“We went from using a basically play-by-picture calling system, to using a 3-4 step play call system,” said Munk.
The play-by-picture is a self-explanatory concept, with every play and scheme on the offensive and defensive side of the ball being drawn out, needing multiple players to wear wrist coaches on the field at the same time.
While the 3-4 play call system allows the players to learn the job of their position and how they should individually execute every single play. By giving everyone their own playbook, they’ve encouraged their players to study their assignments on their own time.
“The focal point of the transition is to attempt to spread the workload,” said Munk. “With the limited coaching staff, it benefits everyone to know the individual duties of their individual position.”
Both of the offensive coaches felt confident until starting quarterback Julianna DiMarzio broke the bad news.
Their quarterback had sprained her thumb at the very beginning of the season, leaving the offensive staff scrambling to find a quarterback to replace their starter in practice.
“The hardest part was the fact that we had a whole installment planned to teach the team the new offensive plays,” said Sussman. “And with our starter hurt, we needed to push back the date on when we were going to teach the newest plays for our game soon.”
The coaches were able to find their replacement quarterback for the time being in Jess Tennant.
Tennant had gone through the motions of the first few team practices working on the defensive side of the ball but agreed to practice as a quarterback while DiMarzio was injured.
“We did a lot to adapt with a new Quarterback and a new system,” said Munk. “Teaching and learning a new system is hard even with your starter, let alone with someone moving over from defense.”
Luckily for them, Tennant had some experience as their quarterback last season but was ready to move on from the position with the addition of DiMarzio.
The whole team is hopeful that Jules will fully recover from her injury before their first game on March 1, with her returning to team practice with light participation this past Monday, Feb. 24.
The team will be traveling northwest to SUNY Brockport to play their Flag Football Team and see how they fare against outside competition for the first time this season.
The whole team is feeling confident ahead of their matchup, including junior Defensive Coordinator Robert Haberger after their final practice before the game.
“We had a lot of time to scrimmage towards the end, and I was able to get a lot done on defense, so we feel great for this Saturday,” said Haberger. With the entire team feeling confident after weeks to practice, there is no telling what they can do for the rest of the season.