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Ira junior Gage Peterson (right) used a stiff arm to escape the tackle of junior Luke Grant during Midnight Madness at Bulldog Stadium Friday.
The Ira Bulldog football team held its annual Midnight Madness practice in front of fans Friday evening and put on full pads for the first time in the 2020 season.
Fans lined each end zone and gathered in the stands to get their first look at the 2020 Bulldog football team. Head coach Toby Goodwin said it means a lot to his team seeing the fans support.
“It’s really cool,” he said. “It’s a tradition we’ve had for a while. To see all the support and have people get all excited and stay until 2 in the morning, it’s pretty awesome. It’s a neat tradition.”
Midnight Madness was the Bulldogs’ first full-contact practice of the year.
After stretching, players went through a pair of hitting drills before running live offensive and defensive plays.
In their first day in pads, Goodwin said he saw a lot of effort from his squad.
“I was really pleased,” he said.
“I thought our effort was really good. The kids were excited and wanted to do some things. Of course, I’m more focused on ‘can you block the guy in front of you?’ Obviously, we have to go to work but for the first day out and with the excitement in the air, I’m leaving pleased. If you can play with effort, you can do some great things and they showed me that tonight.”
The Bulldogs will hold an intrasquad scrimmage following Meet the Bulldogs at 6 p.m. Friday and travel to Garden City for a scrimmage on Aug. 20.