There has been a lot of roster turnover with the Greenfield football team.
When the Green Wave take the field Friday at Vets Field for their season opener against Chicopee, just three players who saw significant time a season ago will be in the lineup.
Though its a new-look roster, longtime Greenfield coach Mike Kuchieski has seen his group grow through the preseason and has been impressed with their work ethic.
“We’re learning right now how to play the game,” Kuchieski said. “We’ve gotten better since Day 1 and all we can ask is that we get better every day. That’s been the motto to do better than we did yesterday. I was pleasantly surprised how we played in our first scrimmage. It’s a good bunch of kids who will get better.”
Greenfield will lean heavily on Angel Politis offensively. The senior running back has been a key player for the Wave the last two years and has impressed the coaches with his leadership.
The Green Wave hope the blocking for Politis is improved this year. To open the season, Jackson Killeen and Maddox Ramsdell will be at tackle, Timmy Derivolker and Phil Ragland will be at guard and Angel Ruiz opens at center. It’s an offensive line the coaching staff has confidence in.
“Angel is a leader for us,” Kuchieski said. “Our offensive line will be pretty strong. Those guys are upperclassmen who played some varsity for us.”
Junior quarterback Gavin Arsenault will be under center for the Wave after mostly seeing time at safety a year ago.
Brayden Slaunwhite and Elliot Holcomb will see time at fullback, Bodie Burke comes over from private school and will contribute, DeSean Carter has impressed at receiver while Taj Diabi saw action at tight end last year and will be a factor this fall.
“We feel pretty good,” Politis said. “We have a solid line and the receivers are looking pretty good right now.”
While Greenfield is coming off a 4-6 season, it closed things out on a high note by winning two of its final three games.
Though it ended well, the Wave weren’t happy with how the campaign went overall. Players like Politis are determined to turn that around this fall.
“We definitely have to get something back from last year,” Politis said. “Obviously everyone wants to go undefeated but I’d be happy with six wins. I need at least six.”
Often times defense is ahead of offense early in the season. But players like Derivolkov say the Greenfield offense has had the edge on its defense in practice, noting how the communication on offense has been strong so far.
“We’re looking good,” Derivolkov said. “I think on offense we’re pretty coordinated. There’s a couple things on defense we need to work on with positioning. We just have to work on conditioning and memorizing plays.”
Kuchieski isn’t looking too far ahead or trying to put any expectations on his team, instead trying to get better each time out there on the field.
“We have to take it game-by-game, day-by-day, week-by-week,” Kuchieski said. “A lot of these kids have a lot of things going on in their lives and football is just an out for them. We’re trying to make everyone understand that we’re a family and that it’s a team game. Football is something that can be important in their lives but not the end all, be all. That’s how we’ve been treating it. Is it the right way? With the kids we have, we decided we have to treat it like that. We’re just trying to keep things together, keep things positive and give these kids a good experience.”
In addition to its five-game Intercounty League North schedule, Greenfield will play independent games against Chicopee, Amherst and Frontier.