Panthers hope to build on last season's strong finish

Going into his 8th season as head coach at Park Hill South, Ron Litchfield knows the importance of starting the season on a good note and to go into district play with momentum. Last year’s team started the season 1-5, but finished the season strong with a record of 3-1. This showed signs that a young and inexperienced team was getting comfortable playing at the varsity level.

“We had a lot of underclassmen playing varsity last year,” said senior Chapman Williams, a returning starter on the offensive line.

“We’re looking to be consistent from game to game and get a commitment to the program at a higher level,” added senior Ben Latteman.

South will start the season off against Fort Osage, a state quarter-finalist last year. In addition, the Panthers will be tested early on with Lee’s Summit and Winnetonka. Along the way they will also play Platte County on October 9th and Park Hill the following week on October 16th in a district match-up.

“The first game is kind of your catapult because you’ve worked so hard and you want to see it pay off,” said Litchfield.

Park Hill South’s emphasis on speed can be seen in their spread out offense and 33 stack defense which allows smaller, more athletic teams to better compete with larger, more powerful teams.

This year’s team will be anchored by an experienced offensive and defensive line including senior Jake Finn, senior Aaron Williams, junior Sam Eickhoff, and junior Myles Krieger. Taking the snaps will be senior quarterback Chris Hamilton. He’ll be handing off to a committee of running backs and sharing the ball among wide receivers Kevan Reardon and Austin Green. Defensively look for linebackers Carlas Mosby and Ben Latteman along with defensive backs Lucas Gardner and Jaron Mickles to make an impact.

“We started about six sophomores last year and the majority of the time this year we’ll have about seven juniors on offense. The defensive side of the ball is a little more senior-heavy with five juniors and six seniors, most of which are up-front,” said Litchfield about his young team.

Building on last year’s development, the Panthers will be more experienced and mature this season. With a speed based team approach, look for them to come back strong this year to surprise some teams and be a threat within the conference and district.