By Eric Sprott
Courtesy The Journal

eric@upstatetoday.com

CENTRAL — When Tim Nix told his team it would be practicing with the Daniel High School football team, it didn’t come as a surprise the members of the 10-and-under Central Tigers were excited to mix it up with some of their football heroes.

What the coach didn’t expect was sleep deprivation over last Tuesday evening’s dual practice at the school.

The 10-and-under Central Tigers got the chance to hit the practice field with the Daniel High School football team in the shadow of Singleton Field last Tuesday evening.
Rocky Nimmons/Courier

“One of my kids, before we got here, said he couldn’t sleep last night because he was so excited about it,” said Nix, who was a member of the Lions’ back-to-back state championship teams in 1991 and 1992. “The kids loved it.”

In the shadow of Singleton Field, the young Tigers stretched out with the Lions and took part in various drills, working on fundamentals all the way through positional drills. Daniel coach Jeff Fruster said the practice was the start of a new tradition with youth teams in the Daniel attendance area, with no shortage of lessons to be learned by both his players and the younger kids.

“Any chance you have to get the young kids around the kids they look up to is mutually beneficial,” he said. “We’re teaching our kids how to be responsible around the young ones and how to model behavior, and we’re teaching the young kids how to work, what it means to be a good teammate and be productive on the field.

“We want to be a high school that promotes the community, and I think it’s imperative that people understand success involves everybody.”

When he was a Central Tiger, senior wide receiver Will Swinney said he looked up to the likes of DeAndre Hopkins at Daniel, and even his eventual teammates when he was a freshman on the 2013 Daniel team that advanced to the state championship game in Columbia.

And with that, he was excited to take part in Tuesday’s outing with the Tigers.

“I thought it was really neat, because I started out as a Central Tiger,” he said. “I know I would have loved to do that when I was their age, and it was a really great opportunity for them and us. It was good to put ourselves out there more … and it was really cool to show them what hard work looks like.

“I know they look at us the same way, so we just try to be good examples and role models. They seemed like they had a lot of fun, so it was really cool.”

This Friday, the Lions will go under the lights at home for the first time this fall when they host Berkeley, and as the Tigers’ season gets set to begin as well, they just might have a little leg up on the competition after their time with the big kids at Daniel.

“This is just great community support, and it was a really fun day for us,” Nix said.