After seeing the first day of official fall practice cut short because of the weather, the Florala Wildcats got in a full day of work on Tuesday afternoon.

“Yesterday, everytime we came out it started lightning and we had to go back in,” Florala head coach Scott Mason said. “Today is going to be our first real day of fall practice.”

Mason said that there is a different feel about this year’s team.

“These guys are ready to get after it this year,” Mason said. “There is a different energy with them this year. They know that we have a shot to do something special.”

Coming into fall practice, Mason said he wants to see his team playing with intensity.

“Be physical,” Mason said of the what he wants to see in fall practice. “We just have to be physical. I want us to become vicious. We need to be vicious. Everybody thinks what you do is finesse and to a certain extent I’m sure it is, but we need to get physical. We were so young last year and we aren’t much older this year. We just have to learn to be physical on offense and defense.”

Mason said he has seen an improvement in that respect.

“I think we have made strides in that area,” Mason said. “That’s what separates us from a lot of people.”

During the first few weeks of fall practice, Mason said that they are working on expanding the playbook.

“We are taking the offense to the next level,” Mason said. “Last year, we were very vanilla. Everybody says ‘There is no way you were vanilla.’ Yes we were. The kids now are running routes based on coverage. That’s great. They have choice routes at the line and they understand what they’ve got to do. Our quarterback understands now. We are trying to go to the next level. We have to get familiar with a more complicated system that we are trying to run.”

The Wildcats open up the season at home against St. Michael Catholic on Aug. 24 at 7 p.m.