Top-ranked Grayson puts focus on regular season, not scrimmages

Only about a dozen Georgia teams are choosing not to play scrimmage games this preseason. That becomes news when one of those is Grayson, a reigning state champion that is the No. 1-ranked team in Class AAAAAA.

Grayson coach Mickey Conn gave three reasons for that. One is the risk of injury. His starting quarterback has been injured in scrimmage games the past two seasons.

Another reason is managing the emotions of his players.

“Too many people put too much emphasis in the scrimmage and turn it into a game instead of a scrimmage, including our players,” Conn said. “They get so amped up for the scrimmage, they have a letdown for the opening game.”

Grayson lost its 2010 opener to Kell 13-10 and defeated Kell 7-0 in 2011. Both games were in the Corky Kell Classic.

Conn’s third reason is his desire to control what his team works on rather than let a game dictate that.

“We’ve done more intrasquad scrimmages to condition the team both physically and mentally,” Conn said. “It gave me the opportunity to work on specific things that I might not in a regular scrimmage because I’m trying to win the game. We felt like we’d get more out of a controlled scrimmage and keep that energy bottled up for the first game.”

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