By TYLER HENRY
Salina Post contributor
A little past the halfway point of their 2021 season, the Salina Liberty look like an unstoppable force in every sense of the word. The team is 7-0 and has beaten every team in the Champions Indoor Football league at least one time this season.
The Liberty have someone in the top three in every major stat category and lead the league in points per game, yards per game, passing, rushing, interceptions and PAT%.
To go with the top offense in the league, averaging 51 points per game, the Liberty have the second best scoring defense in the league allowing just 27.5 points per game.
Despite all of this, Coach Heron O’Neal and his squad aren’t letting the early success go to their heads, and are still laser focused on whoever their next opponent may be.
“We’re still taking things one game at a time because each team has made improvements and gotten better since we beat them,” he said. “We’re not going to overlook anyone or let the past get us overconfident because we know that those games don’t mean anything moving forward.”
It’s clear to anyone who spends time around this Liberty team that things are much different than they have been in the past. In the two seasons before Coach O’Neal’s arrival, the team was just 3-21. In the three seasons since, 24-7 with a trip to the championship in 2019.
The culture around this team has completely changed, with a “Salina Liberty way” beginning to form around a team absolutely loaded with talent. With that culture come lofty expectations, expectations that have helped to propel Salina to a 7-0 start right out of the gate.
“Offensively our goal is to score 70 points a game and to score on every drive of a game and we have not hit that,” O’Neal said. “Defensively our goal is to hold somebody to zero points and we have not hit that so those are the things that we strive for every ballgame and we have not hit those goals at all.”
While some of those goals have gone unmet, the team is in a pristine position at this point in the season, with the closest competitor, the Omaha Beef, well behind the Liberty in the standings at 4-3.
Salina has also survived the last month on the road, and will return home to face the Dodge City Law this Saturday at 6:30pm.
“The thought of getting back to a home Salina crowd brings a major smile to my face,” O’Neal said. “Salina has now gone three to four weeks without football at home and that home crowd played a big role in how well we were able to start this season.”
O’Neal also highlighted that the work that he and his coaches have been tirelessly putting in all season isn’t for them, but for those who have never been in this position before.
“You don’t do what we do for yourself,” he said. “You do it for the ballplayers who have never won a championship, you do it for the ownership and you do it for a Salina community that has never had a championship football team here. We take a lot of pride in being a part of this community and we want to be the first team to bring this town a title.”
The Liberty will play two of their four remaining games at home, beginning with the Dodge City Law this saturday. The last Salina home game of the year will be against Sioux City on the 19th, bookended by road trips to Omaha on the 12th and Wichita to close out the season on the 26th.
For more on the Salina Liberty in 2021 stay tuned to the Salina Post.