Boulder City football players Dawson Livingston, Logan Branscum, and Austin Wishard before the 2015 Season.
Thursday, Aug. 27, 2015 | 9:41 p.m.
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Kickoff time
Las Vegas Sun sports reporters Ray Brewer and Case Keefer spend some extra time on the three biggest games of the week — Arbor View at Desert Pines, Chandler (Arizona) at Bishop Gorman and Liberty at Saint Louis (Hawaii) — before getting to their full picks. They also discuss the hypothetical first pick of a high school football fantasy draft.
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Most of the players on the Boulder City High football team have been teammates since middle school.
That familiarity will give the Eagles an advantage this fall as they compete for a fourth straight playoff experience. It will also help them learn the offense of first-year coach Chris Morelli.
Morelli, who last year coached the Boulder City girls flag football team to the Clark County School District championship, is installing an offense based on play-action passes and runs.
“They have responded well,” Morelli said. “They make the sacrifice to get out there when they had to.”
Leading the offense will be senior quarterback Austin Wishard (6 foot 2, 165-pounds), who completed 11 of 20 passes for 147 yards last year as the backup.
Boulder City returns its leading rusher and receiver from a year ago. Senior Logan Branscum (5 foot 8, 150-pounds) will try to improve on his 535 rushing yards and two touchdowns on the ground as a junior.
A lot of that will depend on the Eagles’ ability to control the line of scrimmage with an undersized offensive line.
“We have to listen to our coaches and get our footwork down,” senior offensive lineman Dawson Livingston said. “We have to be quick on our feet to push those big guys around.”
Those ‘big guys’ being the top two teams in the Division 1-A Sunrise division — defending state champion Moapa Valley and runner-up Desert Pines.
“Moapa has always been strong, it’s a great program up there,” Morelli said. “We just have to play disciplined football to beat those guys. We have to play solid in all three phases of the game.”
Despite Boulder City’s three straight trips to the postseason, the Eagles are a combined 1-9 against Moapa Valley and Desert Pines over the last seven years.
Fortunately, they get Moapa Valley at home this season on Oct. 16.
In order to break into the top of a division that has been dominated by two schools, Morelli says the team will need to eliminate mistakes and control the tempo of the game.
To make a playoff run, they will need to take care of the games they are supposed to win, while stealing a game or two from the bigger teams. And they’ll have to do that while navigating a schedule where they will face a variety of offensive schemes, all with a first-year head coach.
“It’s fun,” Morelli said. “That’s the good part about coaching in this league the way it’s set up. The X’s and O’s part of it, I look forward to every week.”
