Head Football Coach Danny Threadgill (center, pointing) on the first day of Boerne Charger football practice. Photo by Mike Reeder

Like baseball’s spring training, football’s two-a-day practices are all about anticipation and hope — anticipation of the time when the scorching summer sun will give way to autumn’s first chill breeze and hope that the winds of change will carry with them sweet success.

Every team begins undefeated and harbors the hope that the blood and sweat it spills in August will lead to tears of championship joy, and not disappointment, come November.

It is a time when a group of individuals embark on a shared experience that will transform them into that wonderful and mysterious thing called a team.

“That’s what it’s about this year; that and hoping to go do big things with this team,” said co-captain Earnest Jones. “Just coming out on the field and going through drills is exciting.”

“I grew up with a lot of these kids and played pee-wee football with them,” said co-captain Josh Wray. “We’ve got a lot of team unity. But with some of the sophomores we’re bringing in this year we’ve got to get together as a team.”

“That’s the chemistry aspect of it,” Boerne Champion Chargers Head Football Coach Danny Threadgill said after first practice on Monday. “It’s making them understand that what they do affects everybody else. You can see how they get along with each other. It’s not little segments here and there, everybody’s talking to everybody, so we think the chemistry’s there and we think the talent on the field will be there.”

For the 230 football players who took the field Monday morning at the Boerne football stadium, there is additional motivation. Every yard gained and lost and every victory and defeat will be a milestone in the first year of the Samuel V. Champion Chargers, and what these players and coaches do will set the foundation for a new era of Boerne football.

“We’re the new school and that’s added excitement,” Threadgill said. “We’ve got new colors and we’ll establish new traditions. Coaches are kind of used to that because we coach in one place and move to another and change mascots and colors. The good thing here is we still have the same kids.”

Players and coaches know it will take more than good vibrations on the practice field to accomplish their goals. Graduation always leaves holes to plug, and there are gaping ones this year at tight end and linebacker.

Success has been elusive the last two years, the new district may be the toughest in the state and prognosticators have not been kind.

All that matters now, though, is that the players appear in shape and ready to replace talk with action. The next step comes Friday, when the pads go on and real football begins.