Written by: Brandon Baney
It’s no secret that the Payette Pirates football team has struggled to find their footing in the uber-competitive Snake River Valley Conference.
Payette has qualified for the playoffs twice in the entire history of their football program (in 2009 and 2012).
That 2012 squad was also the most recent Payette team to post a record of .500 or better (the Pirates went 5-5 that year).
Despite the lack of success historically, Payette has always been a school chock-full of talented athletes. That’s what excites brand-new coach Marty Avila the most.
“I think we have the kids to do great things,” says Avila. “I just hope they see it too.”
Avila takes the reins after three seasons as an assistant coach. Job number one for the Payette alum is finding a way to replace All-Conference running back Tyler Feely.
“We will miss the energy Tyler brought,” says Avila. “He is a type of guy who always strives for greatness, and when we needed a big play the man always came up with something huge.”
In Feely’s absence, Payette will lean more on junior quarterback Darrien Pecunia. Juniors Cody Pattee and Jahzyon Sylva are the primary candidates to take over at running back.
Sophomore Alan Cox shows promise at wide receiver, and senior Dominic Hughes, junior Calvin Shaffer, and sophomore Hunter Davis are pillars on the offensive line.
Avila admits that Payette’s offensive game plan will be fluid until all of the newcomers become more established.
“It’s hard to get an understanding of what kind of team we will be with all the recent changes,” says Avila. “But we have a lot of young kids that are great horizontal runners and we’ll try to use that to our advantage.”
Defensively, Payette found success a year ago with a strong defensive line. But the leader of that unit, Mark Martin, has graduated. “Mark is someone you can’t replace in the weight room,” says Avila. “The work he put in there showed on the field.”
Shaffer, Hughes and Davis will try and replicate Martin’s success up front. Pattee, Sylva and Cox will factor in at linebacker. And Pecunia will lead a relatively green secondary.
“We have to improve on knowing the coverages in the secondary and making sure our defensive backs understand their assignments,” says Avila.
“We have a young team, but this will be the second year in a row with this defensive scheme, so there will be growth from the kids that ran this defense last year,” he adds.
If the Pirates’ youngsters can develop quickly, there’s a chance they could challenge for a top-half finish in the newly configured 4A Snake River Valley Conference. The road will be difficult, though, as conference foes Homedale, Weiser, McCall-Donnelly and Fruitland were all postseason teams a year ago. The only other league member, Cole Valley Christian, is moving up from Class 3A, and is a bit of an unknown at this time.
But Avila knows that to get to the top of the SRV, you have to get through Homedale, which has played in the state semifinals or championship in each of the past six seasons.
“I believe from what I saw last year, Homedale could surprise some people statewide and finally get to the top of that state championship mountain,” says Avila. “But I also believe that we are on the right path ourselves.”