Jessieville was unstoppable in Friday's 7-on-7 tournament at Two Rivers, defeating all seven of its opponents, including three of them twice.
"We went 7-0," said head coach TJ Burk. "You can't complain about that."
The Lions took on four teams in the pool play portion of the tournament Friday morning before the bracket portion in the afternoon. They downed Two Rivers, Paris and, finally, Magnet Cove in the finals after a bye in the first round.
"All three of those were teams from our pool that we had already played," he said. "We played each one of those twice.
"Mostly, I was pleased with the way we played defensively. We went three straight games at one point without giving up a point to the other team."
The Lions will be off for the upcoming two week Arkansas Activities Association-mandated dead weeks before competing in 7-on-7 action at Fountain Lake all three Mondays in July.
"It's not tournament-style," Burk explained. "We just go and play. It's more for experience. It'll be a lot of getting the young guys reps, so we can kind of progress them along and hopefully find out where they fit as far as their roles for the season."
The Lions are returning most of their offense from last season, but they are still a young team overall.
"Offensively, we're pretty much returning everybody but one, as far as skill-wise," Burk said. "Our quarterback from last year was a freshman. He's a sophomore, Carson Hair. We have two receivers that started last year as sophomores -- Landon Daley and Charlie Davis. We've got Joey Benson, who'll be our tight end/H-back. This will be his third year as a starter for us.
"We've got some experience, but we're still pretty young. As far as skill positions go, he's the lone senior that is at the same spot he was at last year."
The Lions will open the 2019 season at home against Cedar Ridge on Sept. 6.
Sports on 06/17/2019