Football Practice Begins

Mountain View football coaches put the 2024 senior team through their paces Aug. 5 on the first day of football practice. 

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After two seasons of playing 8 man football due to low numbers of players, the Mountain View Yellowjackets will return to 11 man football and a new 3A-2 Conference.

Head Football Coach Michael Gray down played the difficulty in returning to 11 man football from the 8 man football.

“It’s all football,” he said. The coach said the number of players has increased to about where they used to be, and was happy to be playing 11 man football again.

The Yellowjackets will leave their 2 year sojourn into 8 man football with a perfect 20 game winning streak and 2 State Championships. While many of the schools played over the last 2 years were smaller than Mountain View, it should be noted that both sides of the field had roughly the same number of players, so the schedule was balanced with some of the wins being extremely close.

The new 8 team, 11 man  conference schools are: Salem, Mayflower, Melbourne, Atkins, Quitman, Mountain View, Yellville-Summit and Episcopal.

The first regular football games for the Mountain View Yellowjackets begin Thursday, August 29 at Cave City for the 7th Grade and Junior Yellowjackets and Friday, August 30 for the seniors in Mountain View against Cave City. A scrimmage, (practice) game is scheduled for Thursday, August 22 at Little Rock Hall in Little Rock for the Seniors, 7th Graders and Junior teams.

Coach Gray called the 2024 Yellowjackets “A very young team” noting the loss to graduation of 8 talented seniors. Overall team numbers have definitely increased to around 30 and will probably be in the 25 to 30 player range by the time the season starts, he said.

Starting Quarterback is Junior Hayden Long who backed up Drew Shelton last years’ quarterback. The 5 seniors on this year’s team are: Drew Isbell, Rush Sullivan, Roman Day, Quinley Whitaker and Kyle Corners.