Sports
Cheshire Football Wraps Up Spring Practice with Competitive Red-White Scimmage (VIDEO)
Red team scores in final minute to beat White; Ecke, Sansone, Little, Weyrauch look sharp.
The atmosphere around the Cheshire High School football practice field on Monday evening was relaxed with fans and families standing or sitting near the sidelines, some up in the small old-fashioned metal stands and others milling around tables set up near the entrance to the complex with merchandise and information.
Kids ringed the field as well playing catch with any type of ball or sphere available. On the field, bigger kids were getting their first taste of contact football after a week of spring practice. The hitting was crisp and sharp, and the play wasn't nearly as rusty as you might expect.
Cheshire High played its Red-White scrimmage Monday, its team and coaching staff split in two, with senior captain running back Billy Weyrauch leading the Red team and senior captain wide receivers Sebastian Little and Jake Scinto on the White team. Scinto wasn't suited as he is in training to compete in the triple jump this week in the National High School Outdoor Track & Field Championships in North Carolina.
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The two captains that did play figured prominently in the outcome. The Red team won 24-18 as Weyrauch scored on a 3-yard run with under a minute to play in the scrimmage.
Earlier Little had scored twice in the second quarter on touchdown passes from junior backup quarterback Vin Sansone, first on a crossing pattern from the 10-yard line and the second on a streaking sideline pattern that went for 47 yards.
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But the main purpose was to get out on the field and get back into the feel of the game.
"It was exciting to say the least. It was good to be out here playing," Little said. "Getting back to the flow of the game, full contact. The whole flow of the energy was really nice.
"This year I kind of expect to be a little more vocal. Try my best to go out there, have fun, be myself and be a leader by both example and by what I say.”
Starting senior quarterback Michael Ecke threw a 14-yard TD pass to Ryan Stanek for the Red team to open the scoring in the first quarter. After Little's two scores in the second, Red tied it at 12 on another pass from Ecke, this time to Kevin Dietrich that covered 10 yards.
Sansone looked sharp leading the White team and scored its third TD in the fourth quarter on a 31-yard scramble that ended on the right end zone pylon to give White an 18-12 lead. Ecke's 10-yard pass to Nick Palladino tied it at 18.
For head coach Mark Ecke and his staff it's a good opportunity to watch his team develop and evaluate talent and potential.
"It's great. Any time you're around football it's a great thing," Ecke said. "It was a great night for football. Our kids competed on both sides of the ball. We're very pleased. This is the first time we've gone live. We're not a team that tackles a lot in practice, and the tackling was a little suspect that's something we'll work on, but we want to see them compete and get it on film. We'll base our depth chart on what we see on the film going into August."
It's also nice for the coaches to concentrate on fundmentals without other distractions.
"The big part of spring is teaching the kids how to practice and getting them functioning within our system and we think we got that done," Ecke said. "It's a great opportunity for us to teach. It's not like we had a game at the end of the week and we've got to game plan. We can just teach the base fundamentals. It's a safety factor for our kids because they're learning how to do things properly without worrying about the game on Friday night. Spring is a great thing."
