H.S. FOOTBALL: Pottsville focused on playing as a family early on

NCAAF College Football News, Photos, Stats, Scores, Schedule & Videos...

POTTSVILLE — Crimson Tide coach Mike Brennan always likes to see his team playing as a cohesive unit in the early days of summer football camp.

Pottsville was at it bright and early on Wednesday morning and Brennan, entering his third year as head coach, is already making sure his team’s execution and tempo are where they need to be by running live game-like simulations

“We have to execute. We play a game in two weeks so we have to be competing, executing and be conditioned,” Brennan said. “We don’t know what sort of elements we’ll be facing early in the season and we need kids who are ready to roll for four quarters and I think we have that.”

Brennan is a vocal leader, and is now focused on keeping the energy levels up and creating expectations after a 3-8 2025 season that ended with a first round district playoff exit.

“This week is more running around and the conditioning part, and teaching on the run a little bit,” Brennan said. “(We’re teaching) a little more tempo and next week will be a little more physicality. The conditioning will amp up as we go along ,and next week it becomes much more physical and game speed as we prepare for our first game.”

In Brennan’s eyes, to improve from last season, everyone on the team has to grow into their own roles, take accountability, spend time together away from the practice field and play as a family.

“The reason why you lift weights and stay conditioned, go through meetings and everything else is to make plays on the field and be efficient,” Brennan said. “We have to be a lot better defensively this year, create stops and turnovers, and offensively we have to make explosive plays.”

Pottsville allowed 30 or more points in six games last season, and the remedy to that begins with making plays at the line of scrimmage and creating havoc in the backfield.

Playing a more physical brand of football is also in the cards defensively for the Crimson Tide.

Leaders on the defensive side of the ball who have stood out through summer workouts and early practices include Harrison Ciavarella, Colin Klein, Pat Bolich and Nick Huda.

“We need to be better than we were last year, and every time we come to practice we think about that and it being unacceptable,” Huda said. “I always keep it in my mind at practice that we have to finish better than that.”

Similarly, the offense’s success starts at the line of scrimmage.

Offensive linemen Ryan Beltz, Christian Artz and Dmitri Crochunis will block for a talented offense that includes quarterback Andrew Allen, running backs Max Clews and Brody Eroh, and wide receiver Shay Strencosky.

Allen is spending the early portions of camp working on his timing and making sure he gets the ball in the hands of Pottsville’s best playmakers.

Clews is working on his footwork and reading the offensive line to see where holes open up.

“Early on, it’s nice to be able to do things full speed. Earlier in the summer, we were walking through stuff,” Allen said. “Now everything is full speed so it’s lining up a lot better. Being out here with the team every day, we get 1% better every day.”

And with two weeks to go before the Crimson Tide’s season opener against Shamokin, every day counts.

“Getting up early gets us mentally stronger and being here with the guys keeps us going,” Clews said. “When you first get the pads on it’s tough, and then it becomes second nature, and most of us have been playing football for all of our lives so it all comes back to us now.”

More at NCAAF College Football News, Photos, Stats, Scores, Schedule & Videos