By Robert Hudson

The Selma Times-Journal

The Dallas County High School football team will not just be starting a new season on Friday night; they’ll be starting a new era.

New Dallas County head football coach Willie Moore will lead the Hornets Friday night in a season-opening home game against Billingsley High School at 7 p.m.

Moore said he and his staff are making adjustments for Friday’s game based off the Hornets’ performance last Friday in a 9-6 win against Calhoun High School in a jamboree game.

“After playing the jamboree game, we looked at film and saw some things that we could clean up on on both sides of the football and we’ve been working hard on trying to be the best possible team we can be,” Moore said. “We’re focusing on ourselves more so than we’re focusing on what Billingsley does. We have a very young team, so we’re just trying to make sure we’re able to line up and do the things we need to do to have a chance to win.”

Moore said his team is preparing to face Billingsley’s spread attack.

“They seem to be pretty athletic and pretty fast,” Moore said. “They run the spread, so that could give us problems, but we’ll be prepared for it.”

Moore said the Hornets are going to have to maintain balance in order to knock off Billingsley.

“We’re just going to have to be balanced on offense and we’re going to have to contain their speed,” Moore said. “I think that’ll be the best way we’ll have an opportunity to win.”

Moore said the Hornets will also have to be consistent and play a fundamentally sound game in order to win.

The Hornets will take the field with only one starter returning from last year’s team.

Moore said the young team will benefit from starting the season at home.

“With only one returning starter from last year’s team, we’re fairly young,” Moore said. “We’re going to be incorporating 21 new starters, so we hope that we don’t get exposed. I think there’s an advantage for us being at home.”