40 teams in 40 days – Day 25: Schuylkill Haven (11)

Written by: David Mika on Wednesday, August 15th, 2012. Follow David Mika on Twitter.

2011 season

Schuylkill Haven was a real young team with a lot of freshman and sophomore starters.

Their quarterbacks where Freshmen Ryan Fink and Brett Biever. Their leading rusher was Brandon Cooper who rushed for 1,133 yards on 176 carries and 12 touchdowns.

Scott Moyer and Todd Zimmerman were the leading receiver.

Schuylkill Haven finished the 2011 season with a 2-8 record.

Q & A with Schuylkill Haven head football coach Mike Farr

We sat down with Farr and talked to him about his team for the 2012 season.

How is your off-season going this summer?

We put in a new weight room facility. It’s called the “jungle”. We have a lot of athletes working out there.

The kids are working hard. We were really young last season and had 27 players that did not have their learners permit. This year at least they can drive.

Who do you have coming back on offense?

We have nine players coming back on offense.

We only lost one player from our offensive line. Numbers are still down a bit and we only have four seniors on the team. We were pretty good up front last year. Up front we are as big as we have ever been.

My best offensive lineman is Junior Nathanial Kramer. We also have Junior Kyle Wingle. Senior C Brad Biever is back and he is a three-year starter. We have two newcomers and one played a couple of games for us, Sophomore Kenny Harig. We have Dylan Detweiler and Jack Hower who are competing for a spot. We have a freshman Max Motko that we hope will be a big contributor.

We have our sophomore quarterback back, Ryan Fink. Last year he played the first five games and got hurt. During the off-season he has put on about 20 pounds and he is also one of the strongest kids on the team. We are looking for good things from him. He is our best athlete.

The running back position is really by committee. William Casella, Todd Zimmerman, Brandon Weiser and Zach Kerschner will all see some playing time. Kerschner we moved from center to running back this year. We have a lot of depth. We are probably going to rotate seven backs this year.

We have our returning starter back at tight end, Junior Mike Feryo (6-4, 220). We have our split end returning, Sr. Mike Bubeck. Is at split end. We are excepting good things from him. He worked really hard in the off-season. If we use a two tight end set we will bring in sophomore by the name of Kevin King.

Who do you have coming back on defense?

We have nine returning players on defense. We have everyone returning on the defensive line. We will rotate a bunch of lineman up front. Nathanial Kramer will play nose guard in the 50 look. Brad Biever and Kyle Wingler will play the tackles. Kevin King and Mike Feryo will play the ends.

Todd Zimmerman and Zach Kerschner will be at linebacker.

Our defensive back are Mike Bubeck, Brandon Weiser and Ryan Fink. The fourth spot is up for battle. We have a new kid Tay-Shon Green. We are hoping he will get in the mix defensively. We also have a player by the name of John Heffner. We feel he can do some good things for us back there.

We have experience coming back. We hope to improve from last year.

League

I think a year of maturity will help us in our league and physically being able to mature. It’s hard to compete at any level when you are playing with freshman and sophomores.

We should be able to compete better this year in our league. I think we are a year away. We had to pickup two good non-conference teams and one of them is Wyomissing Area who we open up with and Blue Mountain.

To have a successful season you have to?

We need to player better defense. Last year we could score points, but we couldn’t stop anybody.

Home Opener

Schuylkill Haven opens home against Wyomissing Area on August 31^st

40 teams in 40 days

Day 1 – Mount Carmel Area (4) Day 11 – Scranton (2)

Day 2 – Manheim Central (3) Day 12 – Pottsville (11)

Day 3 – Delaware Valley (2) Day 13 – Cardinal O’Hara (12)

Day 4 – Southern Columbia (4) Day 14 – Shenandoah Valley (11)

Day 5 – Berwick Area (2) Day 15- Central Dauphin (3)

Day 6 – Easton Area (11) Day 16 – Scranton Prep (2)

Day 7 – LaSalle (12) Day 17 – Garnet Valley (1)