PINETOWN — Northside’s football team convened on its field Saturday morning as excited as can be. Grogginess from the early morning was immediately negated once the Panthers put on their pads and started knocking one another around.

Jackson Midgette and Matthew Marslender took time commanding Northside’s offense against their defensive counterparts. The Panther scrimmage was complete with an officiating crew and a chain crew. The game-day setup was quite the payoff for all the hard work that has been put in up to this point.

“We’ll look at the film and see what we’ve got, but it was nice to get out an play a little football,” coach Keith Boyd said. “We’ve been doing all the preliminary stuff like everybody else has, but this is how you find out who your football players are — when you put the pads on.”

It was the Panthers’ defense that stood out the most during the first full-contact scrimmage. The size of the defensive line was highlighted, as was the work of the linebacker corps. Given the offense’s run-first mentality, Boyd was pleased to see his defense’s early knack for stopping the ground assault.

“We did good things on both side. Defensively, one of the things that stood out the most was Rhys Alligood on the defensive line,” Boyd said of the 175-pound defensive end. “Parker Boyd played really good at linebacker. All in all, I thought our front was really good and we had a really hard time moving our guys.”

The coaching staff didn’t implement many of the blitz plays seen in the scrimmage until just beforehand, so the Panthers were more or less learning on the fly about what did and didn’t work.

The defense made key stops and forced turnovers. The offense, too, was able to make its fair share of plays. The option-based offense seemed to get more polished as the game progressed.

“We’ve been working read options really hard all summer,” Boyd said. Both Midgette and Marslender were smart with their decision-making in whether to make the run or pitch it to an open running back.

“I thought we read it pretty well. Our quarterbacks got stretched a little bit. We need to get more downhill and go ahead and give the thing up so they don’t string us out. All in all, for the first live time seeing it, I was pretty pleased.”

The Panthers had some highlights on offense. Among them was a 4th-and-long play that saw James Barrow rip off a run for the first down and be brought down well within striking distance of the end zone.

“There were a couple of tackles for losses and we also busted some (runs) for 20 or 30 yards,” Boyd said. “(Barrow) toted the ball well. Our power downhill worked pretty well. That was our most consistent thing. We feel like we’re going to be able to run that play. We were just searching around, tying to find traps and different things. But, when they’re sending blitzes like that, it blows those traps up a little bit.”

While Midgette is likely to start the season under center, it was interesting to watch his offense duel with Marslender’s. Midgette showed off his playmaking ability, despite working with a younger offensive line.

“All in all, they managed it well,” Boyd said. “They were positive in the huddle. Good or bad play, they stayed even keeled. I thought Jackson showed off his running ability and Matthew showed the five inches between his ears is pretty good.”

The intrasquad scrimmage proved to be a productive an exciting beginning of the preseason homestretch. Northside will lineup against the likes of Washington and Southside this week before opening the season at Creswell a week from Friday.