Last season the Norwich football team became champions of the ECFC Division. But this year’s team has no plans to be complacent with last year’s success, according to one of the captains.
“I think that you always have worries as a coach of players getting complacent, but I think our guys have done a great job at working harder and raising the bar,” said head coach Shawn McIntyre.
“We weren’t really all that satisfied with what we did last year, we won our conference championship but a lot of our team’s goals is to get to the NCAA playoffs,” said Captain Rocco DiMeco, 21, senior, physical education major from Holden, Ma
Though last year’s team was strong and motivated, this year, “We’re a much better team than last year, we’re really setting a good example for the freshmen, we have a lot of freshmen that are stepping up and playing a big role on the team,” said Rob Sturgis, 20, a junior communications major from Holden, Mass.
Being the defending champions, the team had its work cut out for it in its opening games this season, playing against Western New England and St. Lawrence.
“Every week is a challenge for us especially with us being the hunted; we’re the team that everyone’s going to come after. We get everybody’s best game every week and the kids have responded well,” said assistant coach Bill Russell
In preseason, “We paid a lot more attention to detail than we have in the past, we made the guys work harder than they have in the past and they responded very well to it,” McIntyre said.
The team has 27 seniors who hold leadership responsibilities. “We were pretty confident that they would be able to keep the guys focused on that job that needed to be done, and so far they’ve done a great job with that,” Russell said.
The football team has experienced one defeat so far this season to its long-time rival Mount Ida. The loss was close, with a final score of 22-21. But this loss helped bring the team back to basics.
“What Mount Ida taught us is that if you think that this game is not going to be a competition, that it’s going to be easy, you’re going to lose,” said Captain Don Hanni, 21, senior, criminal justice major from Youngstown, Oh.
“The kids dealt with it themselves, in the locker room after the game they were more disappointed than we could ever be,” Russell said about the loss against Mount Ida. “Just the way they handled it themselves was a pretty positive thing to see.”
To prepare for games, the team has “very physical practices, tough practices every week, we have scouting reports and watch film every week, in season lifts,” DiMeco said.
“As coaches we do the best job we can so they know what to expect so Saturday there are no surprises. I think we do a good job in practices making it as difficult if not more difficult than the game will be. I think that’s been part of our success,” Russell said.
The remainder of the season is going to be all conference games, against Husson, Anna Maria, SUNY Maritime and Caslteton.
The Cadets last game will be against Castleton which, said Hanni, will “probably be one of our toughest games, because it’s our new big instate rival.”
If the Cadets keep up their winning streak they could grab an NCAA tournament spot. “Our final goal is to make it to NCAA playoffs,” DiMeco said.
“There is a definite possibility, we had a good chance last year with a record of 8-3, so this year I think we have a better chance,” said Hanni.