MARION, Texas — Four weeks into the season, the Marion Bulldogs have already shown they can win in several different ways.
Now, the games begin to carry a little more weight.
Marion will open district play Friday night at 7 p.m. inside Veterans Stadium when the Bulldogs welcome San Antonio Cole, beginning what head coach Joel Call describes as the second season of the year.
The Bulldogs enter district action with a 3-1 record following an impressive 35-13 victory over Class 4A Uvalde, a performance that gave Call plenty to be pleased with while also providing another opportunity to search for areas that still need improvement.
“We try to divide the season up into three parts — non-district, district and then playoffs,” Call said. “This is season two, and this kind of ratchets up the importance of the games. They all matter now when it comes to playoff seeding and making the playoffs.”
Marion closed its non-district schedule by putting together one of its most complete performances of the season against Uvalde.
Call challenged his team to keep its foot on the gas regardless of the score, and the Bulldogs responded by continuing to attack throughout the night.
“We were trying to get them to play pedal to the metal,” Call said. “Don’t take anything for granted. When you sense that, when you kind of see blood in the water, you’ve got to keep attacking.”
That mentality was particularly evident on defense.
Marion intercepted Uvalde five times, continuing a trend that has made takeaways one of the Bulldogs’ strengths through the opening month. The Bulldogs have now recorded 10 interceptions through four games, with pressure up front working hand-in-hand with a secondary Call believes is becoming increasingly comfortable trusting its reads.
Instead of allowing Uvalde’s quarterback time to settle into the pocket and work through his progressions, Marion consistently made him uncomfortable. Behind that pressure, the Bulldogs’ defensive backs communicated and stayed connected on the back end.
“A talkative secondary, a loud secondary is usually a good one,” Call said. “They’re communicating to make sure that everybody’s on the same page.”
That discipline will remain important against a Cole offense that presents a different challenge.
The Cougars arrive in Marion at 2-2 with several athletes capable of creating problems with the ball in their hands, beginning with senior quarterback Karson Scroggins.
Scroggins has shown he can hurt opponents through the air or with his legs, throwing seven touchdown passes while adding four more scores as a runner. Junior Xavier Youngblood gives Cole another versatile option out of the backfield, while Kiosy Steiner provides another threat in the running game.
Cole has also spread the ball around through the air, with Mykell Farr, Marcus Burroughs and Brayden Stringham among several players who have emerged as receiving options.
That collection of weapons helps explain why Call has continued to stress assignment football entering the district opener.
“You know, when it comes to Cole, Cole’s athletic, they’re long,” Call said. “You’ve got some cats you can get the ball in their hand, and once again it just goes back to making sure that gap integrity. We’re doing everything.”
For Marion, containing those playmakers will come down less to chasing the football and more to making sure every defender handles his responsibility.
“If you will take care of what you’re supposed to take care of [then] everything will fall into place,” Call continued. “Effort makes up for a lot of mistakes. That’s why we harp on and continue to preach and hang our hat on that uncommon effort, because it’s the eraser of mistakes.”
That lesson was reinforced against Uvalde running back Cord Williamson, whose physical running style repeatedly forced the Bulldogs to rally multiple defenders to the football.
Call said the experience emphasized the importance of what Marion calls having a “party at the pile,” with defenders refusing to assume somebody else will finish the tackle.
“You can’t just assume somebody’s going to make the tackle,” Call said. “It has to be a group tackle.”
While Cole will challenge Marion’s defense with its athleticism, the Bulldogs have developed their own collection of offensive weapons during their 3-1 start.
That begins with a quarterback room that has given Call confidence in both Hayden Hamilton and Cooper Benavides.
Hamilton has handled the majority of the passing workload, while Benavides has provided another effective option when called upon. More important to Call than the individual numbers has been how the two have handled the competition.
The quarterbacks have continued to communicate on the sideline, help one another identify what the defense is showing and accept feedback from each other.
“Competition breeds success,” Call said. “They’re competing their tails off when they’re out on the field and with each other, and they’re doing it all while being great teammates.”
Marion has surrounded them with several receiving options as well.
Emerson Blevins has emerged as one of the Bulldogs’ biggest threats downfield, while Hayden Balser and Jack Wells have also played significant roles in a passing game that has been willing to spread the football around.
Then there is Chase Colon.
Colon has become one of Marion’s most versatile offensive pieces, leading the Bulldogs on the ground while also becoming a regular target out of the backfield. He has scored six offensive touchdowns through the first four games.
For Call, however, Colon’s impact goes beyond the production.
“He’s hard to see, he’s hard to get a hold of and he’s strong,” Call said. “I don’t think a lot of people realize how fast he is, and then he gets out in the open field and he’s gone.”
Marion has also shown that its running game does not have to flow exclusively through Colon. Hamilton, Benavides and Eli Parker have all contributed on the ground, giving the Bulldogs multiple ways to stress a defense.
That variety has helped Marion start the year 3-1, but Call does not want his team mistaking early success for a finished product.
This week’s theme is to “dig deep.”
Instead of simply correcting obvious mistakes, Call wants Marion searching for the smaller details that can separate a good football team from an elite one.
“We want to nitpick our game,” Call said. “We want to get that magnifying glass out. We want to dig deep. We want to find the problems and the things that we need to improve on.”
That approach follows last week’s message of asking whether Marion simply lost during its lone defeat of the season or whether the Bulldogs learned something from it.
Now, with non-district play behind them, those lessons carry even greater importance.
Still, Call does not want the pressure of district play to change the identity Marion has tried to establish.
The Bulldogs continue to center their program around four core principles — integrity, uncommon effort, enthusiasm and love for one another.
For Call, those principles matter just as much entering the district opener as they did during Week 1.
“It’s about us,” Call said. “We want to be really good in our core values — having integrity, doing things the right way, uncommon effort, playing with enthusiasm and just loving each other. If we’ll do those things, everything will take care of itself.”
Friday will provide the first opportunity to see how those principles translate into what Call calls “season two.”
After a 3-1 run through non-district play, Marion turns its attention toward the games that will ultimately determine its postseason path.
The Bulldogs host San Antonio Cole at 7 p.m. Friday inside Veterans Stadium.