Oak Ridge Starts Anew This Summer With New Head Football Coach Scott Cummings

On Tuesday morning, the Oak Ridge Wildcats returned to the practice fields for their first day of summer workouts.

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Summer workouts at Oak Ridge officially kicked off Tuesday morning at 8:00 A.M. With the holiday weekend, there will be four workouts out of the gate this week. The practices will range from 8:00 AM to 11:00 AM each weekday until the TSSAA two-week dead period that begins at the tailend of June. 

Tuesday was the first opportunity I had to see new Oak Ridge head football coach Scott Cummings and his team this summer. It’s Day 1, and with that comes a sharp learning curve for a lot of kids about what lies ahead and what they have to adjust to in the here and now. “This morning was definitely a wakeup call that you better eat before you get here, you know, or you’re not going to be able to make it,” Coach Cummings told me after practice.

It’s Day 1, which means there is a whole lot of opportunity out there for any Oak Ridge Wildcat to step up this summer and impress this new staff. It should come as no surprise that class of 2024 4-star wideout Brandon Heyward caught Coach Cummings’ attention as a leader early. “Brandon Heyward always steps up right now. I’m very proud of him and his leadership.” Heyward is one of four returning starters on the offensive side of the ball. (Note: The Wildcats also return just four starters on defense this fall, too.) “I thought Peyton Sharpe leads by example and every now and then verbally, too. I thought Brandon Heyward, he always leads. Nick Lucas on the offensive line and Elijah Israel, those guys are kind of the leaders up front for those guys and defensively Brian Kelley will always be a leader over there. You know, so we’ve got some leadership we just got to learn right now that summer is not a time off.”

It’s no secret that the 2022 Oak Ridge Wildcats are going to look different on Friday nights at Blankenship Field. It’s a new staff, a new scheme and a collection of new starters, so it’s going to take some time. For the offensive line, their assignments and expectations will be different than a season ago. “It’s definitely different, you know, there’s similarities in every offense, but we’re definitely different than what they have been doing. With a heavy emphasis on being able to run the football and being physical up front,” Coach Cummings told me. What percentage of run-plays the Wildcats run this fall versus pass-plays remains to be seen. “We’ve got to get Oak Ridge back to being a physical offense and being able to run the football and dicate to the defense what we’re going to do and not let them dictate to us,” Coach Cummings added.

The kids have time to learn. It’s not going to happen overnight, but it’ll start to click more as the summer goes along and more installs are added to their plates. With only three hours each morning for the next few weeks, efficiency is the name of the game. Maximizing your time with your players during this window is critical to get things headed in the right direction right out of the gate.