High school football: West Jordan Jaguars gunning to stage another aerial circus

Note: West Jordan finished with a 7-4 overall record in 2009 and a 3-2 record in Region 3. It lost to Lone Peak, 27-6, in the 5A playoffs' first round.

WEST JORDAN — It wouldn't take Albert Einstein to figure out that West Jordan's offense should be incredibly fun to watch this year.

A year ago, the Jaguars successfully went from a rushing-style ground attack to an aerially-driven spread offense, and the results were quite impressive. With quarterback Adam Boelter at the controls, West Jordan averaged more than 33 points-per-game and had opposing defenses on their heels from the start of the season to the end of it.

Flash forward to the start of this season, and West Jordan brings back virtually every single skill-position player save one (WR C.J. O'Neal.) It's hard, therefore, to fathom the Jags not being electric on offense again this year, and if they can find ways to shore up a defense that was hit pretty hard through graduation, 2010 could be a really memorable year for West Jordan football.

"We have a good team, and we have high expectations," said three-year starter DeShawn Perkins. "We have good teams in our region, so we wanna compete with everybody and we don't want to settle for anything less than what we expect from each other."

When West Jordan went to the spread last year, Perkins, a wide receiver who caught 62 passes for 946 yards and 9 TDS in 2009, was just one of several weapons that Boelter had to throw to.

And throw to those weapons, Boelter did.

Constantly zipping the ball around, Boelter completed 204 passes for 2,600 yards and 27 TDs.

With an entire year with the spread offense under their belts, Boelter and Co. should be all the more lethal this fall.

"This year we gotta shore up some things on offense (but) we're a whole step ahead of last year," said Boelter, who tied a state record for most TDs thrown in a game (7) in 2009. "Last year we had a new offensive coordinator come in and do that. Everything was learning last year. This year we have a lot of returners, so most everyone knows what we're doing and we can do other stuff."

Added Perkins: "We have goals, and for us to know the offense already, it helps even more because we can get more than one play in at a time and we can just go and be quicker. So it gets the defense on its heels not knowing what's coming next."