Prep Football: County teams reload

Westminster quarterback Deryk Kern chucked a Maryland record 63 touchdowns while Manchester Valley's signal-caller Dom Frank racked up well over 1,000 yards rushing and throwing last fall.
Both of those quarterbacks were instrumental in each team's success - the Mavericks appeared in and won their first football playoff game and the Owls were inches away from playing for the state title.
Although neither of their teams made the playoffs, Century running back Tyrice Rock scampered for a school record 1,672 yards and 26 touchdowns as Winters Mill's Wes Cook rushed for over 1,000 yards and notched six interceptions on defense.
All four of them put together seasons that won't soon be forgotten at their schools, around the county or even on the state level in Kern's case. That isn't the only thing they have in common.
Graduation has taken the players from their respective teams and left coaches searching for new players to step in.
The search isn't always a quick one, but Westminster coach Brad Wilson thinks he has found a suitable replacement in McDonogh transfer Duke Etchison.
"I think Duke is good. He was good when he got here. I've tried to tweak a couple things with him. But fortunately for us he was here with us since Week 6 last year and watching us," Wilson said. "He understands how we do things and the learning curve was smaller when we got to 7-on-7s in the summer.
"He can make all the throws, he's smart. Duke's pretty special."
On the surface, Wilson appears to have an easy replacement in the form of Etchison, but Kern meant a lot more than stats to the Owls' high-powered offensive attack. His grasp of the offense enabled the Owls to play at a frantic pace and errant passes became a rare occurrence at Ruby Field on Friday nights.
"We don't want to try and replace those guys. We do want to have the success they had, but we don't try to be like them," Etchison said. "We just want to have our own identity and just go out and play and win games."
Frank's departure from the Mavericks doesn't just leave a pile of yards to replace, it leads to a change in offensive philosophy. Built like a running back, Frank was just as adept at running between the tackles in short-yardage situations as he was dropping back in the shot gun.
While leading the county with 228 carries, Frank racked up 1,232 yards on the ground to go along with 14 touchdowns. When dropping back to pass, he completed 104 of 204 passes for 1,626 yards and 19 touchdowns.
"Certainly with the production that he had, you have to come in here with a different philosophy and how we approach things," Mavs coach Tony Shermeyer said. "Probably you're not going to see the quarterback running the ball anywhere near as much as Dom did last year for us."
Just a mere week ago, three players were still competing for the starting quarterback slot and whoever wins the battle will have Jake Fernandez behind him as the Mavs' lead back.
Midway through last season, Century's Rock was on a pace to threaten or pass Liberty's Calvin Stacey for the all-time single season rushing record of 1,819 yards. He fell short, but still registered a season that ranks third in the county record books.
Showing a combination of speed and vision, some of Rock's single-game performances looked like one seen when playing on rookie level with Adrian Peterson in the newest Madden game.
To open the season, he gashed Frederick for 273 yards, a number that would turn out to be his season-high but not by a very large margin. Rock reeled off 238 yards against Francis Scott Key, 227 yards against North Carroll and 268 yards verse Oakdale. Saving one of his best performances for the large crowds, Rock crashed Winters Mill's homecoming, sprinting all over the field for 266 yards and six touchdowns.
Replacing that production may be nearly impossible, but the Knights have a replacement that coach Jim Holzman said he feels confident in and last season's numbers seem to back that up.
In limited carries, Mike Ashwell ran for 666 yards and averaged 8.2 yards per carry and now seems ready to ascend into the lead back role. Ashwell said he learned a lot from Rock, but he knows trying to match him numbers wise isn't the way to go about it.
"I just do me pretty much. I'm my own person, I'm not Tyrice. I'm Mike Ashwell," he said. "I'm just going to do what it is I do and run like I know how to run."
At Winters Mill, former Falcons coach Ken Johnson named Wes Cook his starting quarterback a year ago and Cook didn't disappoint. Knowing he wasn't too much of a consistent aerial threat, Johnson tailored his offense to Cook's skill set and the senior darted to 1,016 yards and 13 touchdowns on the ground.
Not only did he lead the offense, Cook played defense as well and led the county with six interceptions en route to being named a first-team all-county performer on defense. New coach Matt Miller has turned to an old face to quarterback the Falcons, but he has no illusions of the results being the same.
After starting under center during his sophomore season, Cole Myers stepped back and watched Cook operate last season. Despite not being the runner Cook was, Miller said Myers still has some skills to make the Falcons offense productive.
"You don't replace an athlete like Wes Cook, you just don't. Not many quarterbacks can run like that around here," Miller said. "But we like Cole and we like what he can do. He has varsity experience and I think he is ready to go."
With so many yards and touchdowns to replace, there will be plenty of new faces atop the statistical leaderboards. It won't be easy to replace the seniors, though. Kern, for example, set records that may stand for a long time and his group of receivers snagged touchdowns and racked up yards like no trio in history.
Wilson, for one, doesn't seem too worried that the new offensive players will fail to live up to expectations.
"We are just going to let Duke be Duke and see where that takes us. I tell them I am not going to compare them, they need to create that themselves," Wilson said. "They are very good at what they do. How far they get comes down to how hard they are willing to work at this."