The Nickerson Football Team is Full Speed Ahead at Inman!

The Nickerson Football Team traveled to Inman for their annual football camp on July 17, 2025. It wasn't just Nickerson, however, there were three other surrounding schools in the area! Lyons, Inman, and Hillsboro. 

Their first order of business, among many others, was the separation of skillsets. Specifically, Linemen work separately from Quarterbacks, Tight Ends, Running backs, wide receivers, etc. The Lineman specifically ran hitting drills. Those who work on being able to get lower than their opponent, and taking someone down. During that time, the other positions ran through catching, or throwing the ball, while the other team's defensive players made sure to attempt to cover them. The ball would get snapped to the quarterback, after which the position would run a route and attempt to catch the pass.

For 30 minutes, they continued working on those drills. Until around 9:30, they switched to running through each team's plays. Each team would rotate going on offense, while one team would be on defense. After all of the other three teams successfully ran a play, it would move to another team on defense, and the process repeats.

Finally, for the last 45 minutes of practice, they ran through situation drills. These included both 3rd and long scenarios and redzone scenarios.

This gave me a very nice opportunity to be able to see how the team performs under 3rd and long pressure - and more importantly, how they perform in the red zone compared to other teams. This is especially important to gauge how well the team will do against opponents they will see in the upcoming season (such as Lyons) during these drills, as they ran redzone drills against the defenses of all of the teams in the camp.

Out of the 12 times they were on offense for third and long, they were able to get the first down 71% of the time. Which is very promising! Not only that, but it's an improvement on 3rd downs! Last year, during their homecoming game with Smoky Valley, out of the 7 times in total they got to third down, they only converted 16% of the time. 

However, it wasn't just 3rd downs that we looked at. It was also a redzone offense, because at the end of the day, you can convert as many 3rd downs as you want, but if you never get into that endzone, you're going to have a tough time winning the game.

Out of the 5 times they were on offense for the redzone drills, they got into the endzone 80% of the time! That's very solid!

Switching over to defense. Out of the 18 times the team played defense in the red zone, they prevented the offense from getting a touchdown 44% of the time.

Things are looking up for Nickerson as they continue to get more practice through the summer. While summer weights have been a thing at Nickerson for a long time, I cannot recall the last time Nickerson had a scheduled football practice during the summer.

After practice, I was able to get an interview with Offensive/Defensive lineman Zein Rector. Zein was a CKL honorable mention Offensive Lineman, ranked 10th in preparedzone, and 43rd in all-position in his class of 2027. 

"I'm looking forward to the success [we'll have in the season] we've been putting in the work all summer," Zein says in response to a question about what fans may look forward to in the coming year.

When asked about his personal goals, he seemed very confident in achieving them. "I wanna be CKL first team all league, all state," he followed up by saying what he wants to see team-wise, "I wanna have a good season."

Zein isn't the only one hoping for a successful season this year. Nickerson has not had a winning record since their 2017 season, where they went 7-3, making the playoffs but ultimately losing to Clay Center 20-21.

This season will hopefully be a turning point for the team going forward, with new head coach Parker Bruce taking over. Let's see how this team adapts and evolves over the next few months.