[tps_title]Central Bucks South Titans [/tps_title]
Matt Tobey, Central Bucks South
Defense to be a pillar for Titans in tough SOL
WARRINGTON >> During the regular season last year, the Central Bucks South defense allowed more than 14 points just two times — against Suburban One League Continental Conference champion North Penn and National Conference champion Neshaminy. Six times the Titans held their opponent to seven points or less and they posted one shutout.
Most of that defense is back in 2017.
Four rising seniors and three rising juniors started on the defensive side of the ball. 
One of those rising juniors led the team in tackles — middle linebacker Matt Norris.
“Pretty much every one of our defensive starters had some time last year,” Norris said. “We’re good experience-wise.”
Norris is the type of player you build in a lab. He looks like he’s carved out of stone, standing at 6-foot-1 and weighing 225 pounds.
“He’s been with us since he was a freshman,” South coach Tom Hetrick said. “We don’t bring too many freshmen up, but we brought him up. You could tell right away that he has a lot of natural ability. He understands the game. There’s a lot that we taught him, but there’s a lot that we didn’t have to teach him. He has a good sense of what needs to happen. He’s a good leader and willing to communicate.”
Norris’ brother, Nate, was a linebacker for C.B. South last year. He eventually earned a scholarship to play football at Lehigh University.
“He’s grown up two years behind his older brother and I think those kids have been lifting weights since they were 4 years old,” Hetrick said of Matt Norris, the strongest player on the team. “They live at the gym. I think Matt has grown up wanting to be and do everything that Nate did. He got a jump start on building himself into a pretty physically imposing person.”
With a strong defense led by Norris, a potential Division 1-A college player, South is looking forward to improving off 2016, when it finished with an 8-3 record and lost to Garnet Valley in the first round of the District One Class 6A playoffs.
“Definitely want to build off last year and get a playoff win, at least,” Norris said. “It would be a lot better. We haven’t gotten past the first round of the playoffs in a while. We definitely want to get at least two games into playoffs this year.”
Running Game
South expects to use three different running backs to carry the ball — Jake Layer, Ryan Watson and Tom McLaughlin.
Layer runs angry with an edge. Watson stands at just 5-foot-5, but may be the pound-for-pound best athlete on team. McLaughlin runs downhill, but fast-downhill, not a lumberer.
“We think we’re three-deep at running back,” Hetrick said. “We think we legitimately have three guys that any team in this league would enjoy having running the ball for them.”
Those three will be running behind a new offensive line. The linemen don’t have much experience, but they’re athletic.
“It’s a different kind of a line than we had last year,” Hetrick added. “We were bigger last year. We’re not necessarily going to be the most physically imposing looking team as we get off the bus, but they’re agile, they’re athletic and I think they play angry. I’ll take that combination.”
Biggest Strength
The defense had a great season last year and with seven returning starters it should be even better. Hetrick is most excited to see the front six — led by junior linebackers Norris and Matt Tobey.
“A lot of experience coming back,” the coach said. “A few all-league kids coming back on that side of the ball and on that front. We’re going to put a lot of pressure on them to put us in position to make teams do things that they don’t want to do because the run game’s not working.”
Biggest Weakness
The coaches are confident in a lot of new faces on the offensive side of the ball, but they haven’t seen them perform in game situations yet.
“We just have some guys that are unproven,” Hetrick said. “They have to prove to us that they deserve the good feelings that we have towards them and what they can do … It’s high school football. Every year you have inexperience somewhere.”
By Ed Morlock; emorlock@21st-centurymedia.com
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