Northside loaded with senior leadership across all positions

PINETOWN — Heavy rain cascaded down on Noel Howson’s hands as he prepared to receive the snap from his center. Without missing a beat, Howson dropped back three steps and avoided the pressure by scrambling to his left.

A wave of options moving in accordance with the their quarterback, the Panthers’ field general rifled a pass to the far end of the condensed practice field. Exploiting the man coverage, 5-foot-11-senior wide out Reggie Slade elevated over the defender and pulled down the most acrobatic catch of the morning.

“As you can see, he can jump and run, and he’s able to get up there and bring down some balls,” said Northside head coach Keith Boyd. “We’re excited about him.”

Slade, a dynamic playmaker on both sides of the ball, is one of 12 seniors at Boyd’s disposal in 2014.

“Normally, we’re somewhere between five and eight,” Boyd said. “So I think the maturation of this team is going to be much better with all these older guys. They were out there leading us today and were the ones with a lot of enthusiasm.”

The seniors’ intensity quickly began to rub off on the younger players. By the end of practice, the freshmen and sophomores had caught on and were keeping pace with the upperclassmen in sprints.

Playing off the veteran fervor, Boyd spent most of the practice acclimating his players to the offense, including working his QB through some basic passing drills. With the loss of starting quarterback Malik Slade, Boyd will look to Howson to limit mistakes and pilot the shotgun offense.

Boyd says senior Dalton Etheridge, a baseball player at Pungo who spent the offseason deciding whether or not to transfer, will also be suiting up for Northside this season, giving him another skillful senior athlete.

“We’re looking to them for leadership in the huddle on both sides of the ball because a lot of those guys go both ways,” Boyd said.

Transfers aside, the current core of Panthers’ seniors has improved with each year and the record shows. After a winless season in 2011, Northside notched a 4-7 record in 2012. As juniors, this class, with the help of senior playmakers Malik Slade and Antonio Woods, finished 6-6 last season.

The .500 finish was Northside’s best record since 2004, when the team made it all the way to the Eastern Championship, only to lose to cross-county rival Southside.

This season, Boyd’s preseason confidence is at an all-time high, as Northside looks to shake things up in what’s shaping up to be a very winnable Coastal Plains Conference.

“I think we need that one big win to change us from a 6-4 team to a 7-4 or 8-3 team,” Boyd said. “We have the athletes to make a run. This could be our year.”