The Times - Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley

DAYTON - Just two years ago, the Bulldogs wouldn't have made it among any of the teams in the league to beat in the esteem of other coaches.

But one year after Dean Bickelhaupt took over as head coach, Dayton immediately comes to the mind of his counterparts as a team they'll have to watch out for during the 2011 season.

"Dayton's going to be a lot better," Cardinals' head coach Jeff Bartlow said. "They won games last year and they'll be in the top three."

The Bulldogs won three games last year, including two tiebreakers that sent them to the district playoffs. Two of the players who will be back this fall - quarterback Colton Bickelhaupt and lineman Kroft Sunderland - were selected for all league. It had been two years since the team won any games, let alone go to the playoffs.

They lost their first playoff game against Colfax, the "other" Bulldogs team that ended up beating WP in the state championship runoff.

"It went better than a lot of people expected," senior Dain Henderson said as the season wrapped up in November. "We went further than probably any team in 10 years. I expect the 2011 Bulldogs to be even better."

Henderson's words are giving his former team something to live up to starting later this week.

Establishing the ability to win and getting his players to believe in it was a huge first step in rebuilding the team, Dean Bickelhaupt said.

Now the Bulldogs will have a chance to use that new-found self confidence as a building block in their upcoming games despite the team's disadvantage in numbers. The team has just 25 players this year, compared to 31 last year and compared to a team like WP, which has some 40 members, drawing from Waitsburg, Prescott and Jubilee Youth Ranch.

It helps Dayton this season to have a strong core of five senior starters who are as athletic as they come in the league: Colton Bickelhaupt as quarterback, Hayden Fullerton as running back, Joey Schlachter as tight end, Garret Turner as wide receiver and Kroft Sunderland as linebacker.

This group, which has played a number of sports together through the years and excelled last year in the basketball playoffs, is complemented by the likes of wide receiver Wyatt Frame.

Unfortunately, Frame and Schlachter may have to sit out the first several nonleague games due to injuries, but Bickelhaupt hopes they will be in the starting lineup for the team's first league game against Tri Cities Prep for Homecoming on Sept. 30.

Bickelhaupt said in practice he has been working on the fundamentals with his two dozen players.

"Good blocking and tackling are critical," he said. "It's the little things that make you better."

But whereas it was mostly about the running game last year, Bickelhaupt plans to open up a bigger bag of tricks this year and take it to the air.

"Last year, we had more of a smash-mouth approach to get a tougher mentality," he said. "This year, we can afford to use our talent more. We have good receivers. We'll open up the throwing game and see what happens."

With a year under his belt as head coach, team members are more comfortable with Bickelhaupt's style and philosophy. Less time is spent in practice getting used to each other and more on skills improvement and fundamental drills, he said.

"It's easier to build the program from last year," Bickelhaupt said. "I feel like we're step ahead from last year when it was all about building confidence. They know what I want. They know what the other coaches want. That gives you a step ahead."