Football team looks ahead to new season with new coach

Believe it or not, it’s already time for football under the Friday night lights for Lumpkin County.
At least for one week.
The Lumpkin County High School football team, under the direction of new head coach Heath Webb, is in the midst of spring practice and scheduled to play a spring scrimmage against Armuchee High School in Rome on Friday night.
Lumpkin hired Webb, who most recently served as head coach for Gainesville High School, in December, replacing Caleb Sorrells who was the head coach over the Indians since 2019.
With Webb at the helm, the new look Indians have players, coaches and the community buzzing with excitement. The coach says that’s for good reason.
“There are plenty of reasons to be excited,” Webb said. “[We have] an experienced staff, the largest roster in school history, a region with parity, a hard working, talented team that is hungry for success. Things are lining up. I’d ask the community to jump on board and support these young men in any way they can.”
With the new head coach also comes five new assistant coaches to the high school. Webb said that makes an already crucial spring practice season even more important.
“It’s very important for us to have spring practice. First and foremost, we need to build relationships with the players,” he said. “That’s especially true this year with six new coaches. We also have to evaluate our personnel to make sure that we have all the players in the right position as we head into the summer.”
So far, Webb says he likes what he’s seen.
“Spring practice has gone very well,” he said. “We’ve got over 90 players out and I’ve been impressed with their work ethic, toughness and desire to learn. We’re getting better each day.”
And with Friday’s spring game coming up quick, his team will be tested from the very start of this new journey.
“It’s a very adverse situation,” Webb said of the upcoming scrimmage against Armuchee. “We only get nine practices with a new staff to learn a new offense and a new defense. And on top of that, we’re asking them to learn a new opponent, learn a gameplan and take a long bus ride to play an opponent with many returning starters and a staff that has been in place for years.”
Webb said this kind of tough situation was the plan all along.
“Everything is stacked against us and that’s exactly what I want,” he said. “I believe that you learn a lot about a team when you put them in adverse situations. With all that being said, I expect to see our guys compete like crazy because we’ve learned that they will do that this spring. I believe we will step up to the challenge.”
As for his team, Webb says he hopes those that make the long trek to watch his team will see the work they’ve put in.
“The things I hope people see when they watch us is class and toughness,” he said. “I hope they see us physically whip people and then pick them up off the ground. We are using the scrimmage as a form of experimentation so we’re going to try some different schemes on both sides of the ball as we continue to learn more about our team.”
Lumpkin is set to take on Armuchee in Rome at 7:30 p.m. on Friday.