The football season kicked off with a bang as Langham Creek’s Varsity team won its first three games. The team’s next match will be against Bridgeland this Friday, but before then, let’s take a look at the work that brought them here.
The team undergoes a year-round training cycle that requires routine practice before the season even starts. Once it’s began, there’s a game almost every weekend.
“It’s a big commitment,” Head Coach Todd Thompson said. “For a lot of kids, it takes up a lot of time. It’s gotta be hard work because just playing football is hard. It’s challenging.”
The team’s training began in December, entering them into the first cycle of preparation.
“First thing we started was what we call boot camp, which is about discipline and doing things right with all our football players,” Thompson said.
Now that the season’s started, the team has transitioned to a busier schedule.
“Guys are here at five-thirty a.m., so we start before school, which I know some of them find rides or have long drives, so it’s hard to get here sometimes, but they are getting here to practice,” Thompson said. “It’s a big commitment to play. These guys put in a lot of work to go out and play in those games on Friday-Saturday night.”
The transition also sees a shift towards more precise strategizing.
“As far as practice goes, in pre-season, it’s more about technique and being able to do things right: tackling, blocking, just basic football skills,” Thompson said. “ During the season, it’s way more specific to the team we’re getting ready to play.”
For freshmen, the more rigorous schedule of high school football serves as a major shift.
“It’s brand new to them [freshmen] because in middle school, it’s totally different,” Thompson said. “The number of kids, number of coaches, the size of the school—all those things take some adjustment.”
While training can be hard work, it’s also an opportunity for the team to bond.
“These guys are up here so much, and they’re working so hard together that it becomes a really close group,” Thompson said. “They spend so much time, whether it’s in the weight room or just in the locker room every day getting dressed, changing clothes, in the mornings, riding with each other, eating with each other […] So it’s kind of natural that they become close—a close-knit group—because they’re spending so much time up here with each other.”
Langham’s first game was against Katy Paetow, a school with a large team and many experienced varsity players.
“The game started off about as bad as it could,” Thompson said. “They scored a touchdown on the very first play of the game.”
But Langham endured and edged out a victory, 22-21.
“We hung in there and did some things right, and had some plays that helped us toward the end of the game and were able to pull it out and win by one,” Thompson said.
Their close match was not only a moment of victory but also a learning experience for the team.
“They [the team] were excited,” Thompson said. “It builds confidence whenever you go out there and you beat another team, and especially [when] we went through a lot of situations during that game that should help us during the season because we had to come back from behind.”
The following game against Jersey Village proved to be easier with Langham winning, 54-3.
“The good thing about that game was that everybody got to play,” Thompson said. “When it’s a close game, some of the backups sometimes don’t get in the game. And in a game like that, everybody got to play and be a part of it.”
Langham won their following match against Cypress Ridge, 59-21, earning them a strong winning streak as they prepare for their next match against Bridgeland—a team that has historically beaten Langham.
