In 2019, Lancaster football was outmanned in tough 4A region. That’ll change this year
Its game against South Pointe last November told the story of the Lancaster football team in 2019.
And it also indicated how much the group could grow.
In that game, the Bruins stunned an undefeated South Pointe team early. They were up 21-8 at one point. Sean Truesdale, the Bruins’ junior quarterback who’ll lead the team in 2020 as a senior, ran for 95 yards and two touchdowns before having to throw a pass. Juelz Hood, a sophomore running back at the time, looked unstoppable.
But postgame, after his team gave up 34 unanswered points in the second half, Lancaster head coach Marcus Surratt had to explain another loss. Perhaps unfairly, Surratt blamed himself.
“I felt like our guys were prime to start learning how to win, and it was my job to finish facilitating that and close the deal for them,” the coach told The Herald at a practice earlier this week when he recounted that game.
Surratt’s thoughts reflect an unfortunate reality for the 2019 Bruins, who went 2-9 and whose season ended in the first round of the 4A state playoffs: They were almost always outmanned.
Because they had to sometimes dress less than 30 guys on Friday nights, linemen had to play both offense and defense. The offense ran zone-reads and dive-options by necessity. From the first play of the game, Surratt was checking the clock, managing it — calculating when he should take chances and when he should just run the ball into the line to preserve his players’ legs for later in the game.
“I feel like last year, with the linemen, with them having to go both ways in the trenches, that’s a big thing,” now-senior quarterback Sean Truesdale told The Herald at a practice. “Not many linemen can do that, go both ways for four quarters.
“This year, it’s not like that.”
Surratt said that 82 players have consistently come to workouts and practices this summer, nearly double the amount of players he had between his JV and varsity football teams in his first year at the Bruin helm in 2019. And that’s with a pandemic making the team meetings irregular.
In fact, four players wanted to join the team on Wednesday, Surratt said, because “we had a good showing” during Saturday’s scrimmage. (“That’s all we can attribute it to!” Surratt said.)
“Even with these guys, I still think that there are 20 more kids that we can go get between now and next football season,” Surratt said. “I still think we have plenty of room to grow. And what you see is not even all of them. We got plenty of room to grow, and to continue to get better. We just have to make sure that we’re making a concerted effort to give the young men something that they may have not had in the past, or give them something they want to be a part of.”
Surratt added: “Now, we’re moving from being a team that can play, to a program that can play. And that was one of my big goals: to make sure that we get out of team mode and start transitioning to program mode.”
Lancaster offense and defense defined by youth
Despite graduating two college-level players in Will Burton and Immanuel Bush last year, Lancaster returns a lot of talent in 2020 — and they’ll be returning even more in 2021.
Surratt has less than 10 seniors in his program this year, he said.
On offense, Lancaster will have Truesdale at quarterback and Hood and bruiser Tyquan Bowser at running back to fill out what should be a prolific backfield. The offensive line has a “good mixture” of underclassmen and upperclassmen, which includes junior Ja’maryun McGriff.
On defense, Surratt said many players without much starting experience will get their chances. Leaders on defense include defensive end Fred Twitty, middle inside linebacker Akeem Ford, outside linebacker Eric Byrd and free safety Zahir Moffatt.
Truesdale admitted that his team might be a bit underestimated ahead of the upcoming season — a result of being in one of the toughest regions in 4A. The Bruins’ region boasts South Pointe, Indian Land, York and Catawba Ridge.
But he also knows that the Lancaster football program is on the rise.
“It makes me feel good that I’m leaving here with the program going on the up, not going on the down,” Truesdale said. “I think that’s always a positive, that I’ll be able to come back and say, ‘Oh they’re doing good. They’re doing better than when I left.’”
Lancaster football 2020 schedule
Sept. 25: OPEN
Oct. 2: South Pointe (away)
Oct. 9: Catawba Ridge (away)
Oct. 16: York (home)
Oct. 23: Indian Land (home)
Oct. 30: Fairfield Central (home)
Nov. 6: Fort Mill (home)
Editor’s note: This story is one of 15 high school football previews The Herald will run prior to the first game of the regular season on Sept. 25. Look out for the next one to appear at heraldonline.com later this week.
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