Jamborees will give sneak preview of area teams

What's the key to success in tonight's high school football jamborees?

"Staying healthy," cracked veteran Chaffee coach Charlie Vickery.

Normally, that's an important part of it. But tonight's jamborees come with fewer days of practice as an accelerated preseason schedule has been implemented to accommodate an extra round of football games. This year, for the first time, the top two teams from each district pool instead of just the champion will advance into the state playoff bracket.

With that extra round of playoffs pushing the start of the regular season closer to the start of fall practices, tonight's jamborees could be the most useful to coaches since the state began the scrimmages in 1997.

"I think the jamborees are going to be more important than ever before," St. Vincent coach Keith Winkler said.

Winkler said his team has had 10 practices -- including seven full-pad practices -- heading into the jamboree, while 15 practices are the norm before a team steps on the field with another team.

With the fewer practices and an added emphasis on summer workouts, Winkler said, "I think your experienced teams are going to be ahead and your inexperienced teams are going to behind more than normal."

Chaffee, like Class 1 District 1 rival St. Vincent, will have about a 50-50 balance of returning starters and players taking over starting roles.

"You just want to see how your kids are in terms of being aggressive, and getting some of the butterflies out," Vickery said.

But, he added, "With just two weeks instead of three weeks before the jamboree, you have to use this as a practice and you have to run your stuff."

Winkler's jamboree will include three Mississippi Area Football Conference Blue Division foes, so he doesn't expect to see everything in those teams' playbooks.

"For us, the most important thing is getting a good read on our kids and how they'll react in game situations," Winkler said. "We may coach it up more because of the fewer practices this year. We've usually had two or three intrasquad scrimmages by this point, and we've only had one this year.

"Everybody's in the same boat, though."

Tonight's jamborees

Dexter (6 p.m.) -- Scott City, Dexter, Kennett, Portageville.

East Prairie (6 p.m.) -- Perryville, Sikeston, New Madrid County Central, East Prairie.

Farmington (6 p.m.) -- Central, Poplar Bluff, St. Clair.

Farmington (7:30 p.m.) -- Jackson, Farmington, Union.

Malden (6 p.m.) -- Chaffee, Malden, Charleston, Fredericktown.

Festus St. Pius (7 p.m.) -- St. Vincent, Grandview, Crystal City, St. Pius.