Conversation with the coach… Jaguars Head Coach Winters feels confident in the upcoming season

Victor Winters, the head coach of the Gadsden County High School Jaguars varsity football team, is feeling positive about his team for the 2022 season.

“I’m feeling pretty well about the season, even though we’re 0-2” Winters says. “I saw some good improvement last week, we held [Wakulla High School] to only three points in the second half. The kids are finally starting to trust the coaching staff and get on the same page as us. We haven’t lost any district games yet, so the playoffs are still wide open. That’s our ultimate goal.”

When asked what he thinks will be the toughest matches the Jaguars will face this year, Coach Winters feels that the first four games of the season, against Lowndes, Wakulla, Lincoln, and Florida State University High might present the greatest challenges.

Despite losing the first two of these games, Winters sees plenty to be optimistic about the future of playing against these teams.

“Our biggest strength is our size,” says Winters. “We’ll be trying to take advantage of it. Trying to be a smash-it-out team. Getting away with the spread. Taking advantage of the offensive line, the average is about 302 pounds. And we have some pretty solid kids on the defensive line that a lot of people are looking at. So that’s what we’re trying to capitalize on.”

Winters also has a list of some of the stand-out players to keep an eye on this season:

“On offense, we have Daveion Harley (#55, offensive line, nose guard, senior), who’s been a four-year starter for us, he is committed to Jacksonville State. Our running back, Cedric Byrd (#5, senior), who’s already got 216 yards rushing in two games. Our breakout players are probably going to be our quarterback, Shawnterris Thomas (#1, junior) and wide receiver Nasir Williams (#4, junior). On defense, we have Tay’Marius Clemons (#10 outside linebacker, defensive end, senior), Kaveon Ruffin (#6, senior) and Saivion Kenon (#8, senior), my defensive backs, and then our big threat is Josiah Knight (#9 defensive end, junior), who is starting to get a lot of looks. Those are our key players.”

Coach Winters then names his primary goal for this season: “Our number one goal this year is to make it to the playoffs, and go deeper than we did the year before. We got to the second round, then were eliminated. The year before that, we made it to the Final Four. So we’re trying to get back to that route to the State Championship, trying to keep everybody healthy, and hopefully we can get a lot of the kids signed into colleges, or the military.”

Finally, Winters expresses no small amount of pride in the Gadsden County High School Football program and its accomplishments, which transcend winning and losing games.

“We do have good kids here at Gadsden County High School. We have signed more kids in our school than any school in the Big Bend in the last three years. We have high level kids. We have one playing at Jackson state, one playing for Miami, one playing for Florida State. We have a plethora of them playing at community collages, getting ready to transfer to major collages. The talent level has always been there. We're just looking for more visibility, and most importantly for people to know we have good kids here."

Victor Winters, Head Coach of the Gadsden County High School Jaguars varsity football team.

Stephen Klein - Gadsden County News Service

Conversation with the coach… Jaguars Head Coach Winters feels confident in the upcoming season

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