Greensburg Central Catholic’s Colbert puts offseason focus on fundamentals

By: William Whalen
Tuesday, July 2, 2019 | 7:04 PM

It’s been nearly six months since Bret Colbert was hired to lead the Greensburg Central Catholic football team to its next era of gridiron glory.

Spend a few minutes talking football with the rookie head coach and one will immediately get a sense the former college wide receiver is in love with his defense and excited about his skilled payers and interior line on offense. But the former Saint Vincent offensive coordinator is drawing a blank at the most important position on the field: quarterback.

“We are still sifting through what we can do (at quarterback),” said Colbert, who spent the last two seasons as the Centurions wide receivers coach.

GCC graduated quarterback Max Pisula, who combined to run and throw for 30 touchdowns last season.

This summer, the Centurions have stayed away from the world of seven-on-seven football camps and competitions. Instead of force feeding his team plays they might not even run during the regular season, Colbert has decided to stay home and work on the fundamentals and position drills to get everything down by the numbers and making the basics muscle memory.

“They’re anxious to get the playbook,” Colbert said. “I’m telling them that the fundamentals are more important than the X’s and O’s right now.”

The Centurions will make their seven-on-seven summer debut at the annual Westmoreland County Coaches’ Association competition July 18 at Latrobe.

“I’m not big into seven-on-sevens,” Colbert said. “We’ll line up a couple here this month.”

There’s no rush to get involved with the passing tournament circuit because Colbert is still trying to identify who is going to lead the offense. With Pisula now playing at Washington & Jefferson, there’s a huge hole to fill behind center.

Colbert has several candidates who are on the opposite ends of the player spectrum but have the same amount of experience.

Junior David Altimore is a veteran who backed up Pisula but doesn’t have much game experience.

Freshman quarterback Nate Dlugos will join his brother Zach, a junior running back, and cousin Danny, a sophomore H-back, on the Centurions this fall. Nate started at quarterback for the Westmoreland Saints but also lacks varsity reps. Whichever quarterback who can show poise, be consistent and protect the ball will ultimately win the starting job.

“It’s a matter of distributing the ball to the playmakers and moving the ball down the field with efficiency,” Colbert said. “Confidence is huge at any position. If you don’t have confidence, you’re not going to believe in yourself.”

Colbert is confident in his playmakers on offense. The Centurions have plenty of pass catchers on the outside in seniors Brandon Brown, Luke Mazowiecki and Ben LaCarte, along with sophomore Joe Blahovec. Once again, the question always comes back to who is going to get the ball there?

“We’re gonna put them in positions to maximize their strengths and minimize their weaknesses,” Colbert said.

Until things get sorted out on offense, the Greensburg Central defense is going to need to lead the way early. With Brown and Mazowiecki at defensive back, seniors Chase Pisula and Isaac Kuhns anchoring the defensive line, senior Zach Kuvinka and Zach Dlugos at linebacker spots and add in upstart sophomore defensive end in Zander Colcombe coming off the edge and there’s a lot to be excited about on the defensive side of the ball.

“The good news about our guys is that we’re looking at projecting a starting 11 on defense that I think can play in college at some level,” Colbert said. “There may only be 30-some guys on the team, but we have a lot of talent. I don’t think who is on the field will ever be an issue on defense.”

William Whalen is a freelance writer.

Tags: Greensburg C.C.