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| Nathan Blei delivers a pass during the Buccs' Midnight Hit. |
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| Nate Armentrout works on his rushing technigue. |
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AUGUST 7, 2015 - COVINGTON
Since Dave Miller took over as head football coach in 2007, Midnight Hit has become an annual tradition at Covington.
It's an evening where Buccaneer fans get their first glimpse of the team in action and an opportunity for the kids to showcase the results of their off-season work.
It's also a chance for the kids to FINALLY HIT SOMEBODY under the rules of the OHSAA.
"The kids always seem to get up for this," said Miller of the Midnight Hit. "This year especially. The kids have a bad taste in their mouths about last year and you could tell that from the way our summer went."
For the first time since Miller has been head coach at Covington, every player who reported for two-a-days last Saturday spent the entire summer in the off-season conditioning program on a regular basis.
"All of the kids have been there in the summer," Miller said. "We lost a couple of kids, but those were kids who weren't fully committed. All of the kids we have now are fully invested."
And it showed during the Midnight Hit as this may have been Covington's best performance from top to bottom in the annual event.
"I really like the way the kids got after it," said Miller. "The two things I look at in the Midnight Hit is number one, how fast do we move around, and number two, are we physical? The kids answered both of those questions tonight. I felt we flew around the field tonight and played very physical."
Many fans seeing the Buccs for the first time may be concerned with the fact that just 32 players round out the Covington roster. But Miller isn't concerned by what is minimal numbers compared to the past few years.
"Yeah, we have 32 kids, but all of these kids can play," he said. "And the kids are tight too. There's a brotherhood here between these kids. They pull for each other and encourage one another. I really like our team chemistry, especially considering we are this early in two-a-days. A lot of that team chemistry was developed over the summer because they all were invested from the beginning."
And surprisingly, the Buccs have adequate depth despite the numbers.
"Would we like to have more kids, absolutely," Miller continued. "But hey, even with 32 kids we have some depth there. It showed tonight. We have a lot of kids back from last year and some freshmen who can play. Where we are lacking, in a sense, are the numbers at the reserve level."
For the Midnight Hit, the players took to the field at approximately 10:30 on Thursday night and went through their normal warmup for a game.
Then the team conducted a short non-contact practice in each phase of the game - offense, defense and special teams.
After a short fifteen-minute breather, seniors Brandon Magee and Ben Kuether lined up to bring the 2015 season into full swing with the first hit at exactly midnight.
From there, each player paired up to to go head-to-head against each other in a full contact situation and then the Buccs went through a mini-scrimmage to conclude the festivities.
And through it all, the enthusiasm and intensity was at a level Miller liked.
"I can't say enough about how pleased I am with the kids and the way they got after it tonight," he said. "It's a good start - and we have to take it for exactly that - it's a start. There are a lot of things we need to improve on, but we're headed in the right direction."
And Covington has little time to prepare for its next challenge, which comes Monday evening in a full contact scrimmage against Milton-Union.
"That's the next step, going to Milton and seeing how well the kids respond to facing someone in a different color jersey," Miller said. "That's always a good scrimmage for us because they play a physical brand of football too."
And how Covington performs will give Coach Miller more information on what his team needs to improve on over the next few weeks before the season opener at St. Henry.
