The 2018 Fulton Falcons featured 22 seniors and Mr. Football award winner Deshawn Page. They are all gone. This leaves the 2019 team with the task of replacing 18 starters on offense and defense.
"We're having to coach some things right now that we hadn't had to coach the past couple years," head coach Rob Black said. "A lot of questions are going to be answered in the next couple weeks, as far as what we're going to do, what are strengths are and what are weaknesses are."
Black does not view this task in a negative light, as some others may. It believes having to replace a plethora of starters creates good competition during camp.
The Falcons have a classic camp quarterback battle between rising juniors Jeffrey Riddle and Tommy Sweat. Last year, Riddle played with the JV team and Sweat mostly played safety with the varsity team.
Black said people have looked at Fulton's youth and counted them out for this season. That has given his players some motivation for the season.
"We've got a lot of guys looking at that and wanting to prove people wrong," Black said. "I'm excited about this group and the fact that they're listening to this noise and trying to squash it."
Fulton's season starts against South Doyle on Aug. 24.