Local football squads tune up for season

The next time that many local high school teams put on the pads and helmets, the games will count for real. Several local teams spent the Labor Day weekend working out the final bugs for their season openers next Friday and Saturday.Two of those local teams happened to meet on Monday in Lynn as St. John’s Prep and Classical knocked heads.”I think it was good work for both teams,” St. John’s coach Jim O’Leary said. “We got to play a lot of guys. We are looking to get some kids playing time and some depth and I think we were able to do that.”Meanwhile, on Saturday, Swampscott traveled south to scrimmage Foxboro. The teams kept score, with the Big Blue dropping a close 23-16 decision.”It was a good scrimmage,” Big Blue coach Steve Dembowski said. “We got a lot out of it. We finished healthy. We’re making progress. It was a good preseason.”The Swampscott first team played the majority of the scrimmage, between two and a half to three quarters.”The offensive line did a nice job, the quarterbacks did a good job and defensively we were pretty active,” Dembowski said. “The linebackers did pretty well.”Jermaine Kelly, Mike Walsh and Brian Sullivan are the Swampscott quarterbacks this season. Dembowski said he is not sure who will start.At running back, the Big Blue has two seniors, Phil Larkin and Jake McDougall. Dembowski praised both players’ performance on Saturday. Kyle Shonio, who got the majority of the carries last season, is now playing defense at Framingham State.”We’re progressing on a daily basis,” Dembowski said. “We improved a fair amount from our first scrimmage.” The coach also said he felt his team got some good preparation for its season opener against Gloucester, which he characterized as a tough opponent.The Eagles open their season at home on Saturday (1:30) when they take on Peabody at Cronin Memorial Stadium. St. John’s comes into the year with 23 seniors on its roster but will have a team comprised of a lot of underclassmen.”We are going in this year a little inexperienced,” O’Leary said. “It’s kind of an anomaly that we have such a small class of juniors so we’re in the situation right now were we are very inexperienced.”O’Leary also came away impressed with the Rams’ size and speed.”Classical is a very good team. They’ve got some size and are very physical,” O’Leary said.The Eagles also scrimmaged Lynn English on FridayClassical will begin its season on Friday with a trip to West Roxbury to play Catholic Memorial.(Rich Tenorio contributed to this story.)