ANDREWS The Andrews Mustangs are coming off a 6-6 showing from last year, but with the number of starters they have returning, there’s plenty of reason for them to be excited about this season.
So eager are the Mustangs to get the 2024 season started, they will be holding their own Midnight Madness practice this Monday at Mustang Bowl.
“We’re excited,” said Andrews head coach Tom Harvey, who enters his third season in charge of the Mustangs. “Midnight Madness is something our players have been wanting to do this for a while. Our coaches have to go to teachers’ meetings the next day, so they’re going to be tired but it’s not going to be a short practice. We’re going to go from midnight to about 2:45 a.m. … We’ve been pretty young for a couple of years now. While not every position on the field is going to be taken by a senior, we’re going to be older and more experienced. I think everyone’s excited about football being back.”
The team returns nine starters on offense and seven on defense from last year’s team that went 6-6 overall and 2-2 in district and made it to the area round of the playoffs.
Quarterback Aidyn Olivas is gone. Replacing him will be Kade Adams, who Harvey is confident can succeed in the Slot-T formation for the Mustangs.
“We lost a really good quarterback and a we lost a good center,” Harvey said. “Everyone else on offense last year is back. The kids that were on JV are legitimate backups. We have a great center coming in and we have a capable quarterback coming in Kade Adams. We’ve never had a left-handed quarterback in the Slot-T, but he’s going to be a good one. We have other kids competing. We have a good JV coming up to varsity. We’re pretty seasoned.”
Of course, the big returning player on offense will be running back Jeasean DeBouse who ran for 2,236 yards and 25 rushing touchdowns last year.
“It’s not like we’re starting 11 seniors, but we have Jesean coming back but he’s only a junior,” Harvey said. “He’s been going to football camps all summer and been working on his game. He’s one of the best offensive players in this part of the state if not the whole state. Defensively, we lost some good linemen, but we have all four linebackers back and they’re not all seniors. We have a good team coming back but they’re not all seniors. We’re in a good place. If we can stay healthy, we have a good chance.”
Even better news for the Mustangs is that District 3-4A Division I only includes four teams, automatically guaranteeing Andrews a postseason spot.
The bad news is that Harvey is weary of a Big Spring team that could potentially pose as a threat, despite coming off a 2-9 record.
“What scares me is (head coach) Cannon McWilliams at Big Spring,” Harvey said. “They’re going to be a lot better this year. He’s a good coach and his kids play really well. They’re going to play hard. I’m glad that’s a home game because he’s got Andrews’ number. He’s a good friend of mine. But he scares me and his staff scares me. I don’t know much with Pecos but we see Big Spring at a lot of events in other sports.”
Pecos and San Angelo Lake View will make up the remainder of the district.
Also posing as a challenge will be the Mustangs’ nondistrict schedule which starts off with Clint on Aug. 30 and also feature Canyon (Sept. 6), Midland Greenwood (Sept. 13), a new opponent in Wichita Falls Memorial (Sept. 20) and of course, Monahans on Sept. 27.
Lubbock Estacado will pay a visit to Andrews on Oct. 4 in a game where the Mustangs will be hoping for revenge.
“I think we have the hardest and toughest schedule,” Harvey said. “Hopefully, it gets us ready for district and to play in December. We have a schedule that should get us there. We’ll need to stay healthy. We have some good competition. We have Canyon and we play them every year. Their coaches do a good job. They’re in a part of the state where they have to play well every week because of their schedule. We play Greenwood and they’ll be better. They have a lot of kids coming back. We were young last year and so were they.”
