Brownstown Central football coach Reed May says the main thing about his football team is getting better.

“Last year, we struggled,” he said. “Obviously, 6-5 is not a good record for us. We had a lot of injuries last year. A lot of the injured people are back now.”

The Braves had a busy week last week as they attended the Hanover College football camp Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and hosted a 7-on-7 competition Saturday with Bedford North Lawrence before the lightning came to shorten the schedule.

Franklin decided not to come because of the weather.

May said teams are allowed to practice every day during the summer except for the moratorium week but can only have 12 practices in pads prior to the start of regular practice on July 31.

The first practice teams may have contact is Aug. 3.

“We had given them off June 22 until July 10,” May said. “Usually, we do our 7-on-7 next week, but Micah (Sheffer), our quarterback, is going to be at a golf tournament, so we had it (Saturday). We were able to get in two varsity 7-on-7s and one JV 7-on-7, and the linemen got to do a little stuff.”

May said he and the coaching staff are working with 62 players, including 10 seniors.

“We have more experience this year because we had to play a lot of young kids last year,” he said. “I think we’ve got a chance to be a decent football team. At one time, we had five sophomores starting on defense at one time at Hanover camp. We’re still a young team. Some of that is because of injuries, and some of that is because of other reasons. It’s going to be a learning experience. I think strength-wise, we’re going to be a lot stronger than we were last year, so now, we just need to correlate that to football.”

May is beginning his 31st year as head coach of the Braves and said Sheffer will be the second sophomore to start for him at quarterback with Clay Brown being the first.

“He’s played quarterback all along, and we kind of figured his sophomore year he’d be our starting quarterback,” May said.

Carson Darlage started at quarterback for the Braves the past two seasons.

There is a lot of experience returning at slotback with Isiaah Engle, Lane Zike, Gregory Hutcheson, Grant Killey and Chick Tiemeyer at fullback. Hudson Fritz and Easton Branaman will play a lot as wide receivers.

May said the Braves scrimmaged against Southridge, Providence, Edgewood, South Spencer and Eastern (Pekin) at Hanover.

“We were able to go 11-on-11 against those teams,” May said. “We have it on film, and any time you have it on film, that helps you evaluate.”

This week through Friday, the 56ers camp will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. at Blevins Memorial Stadium, and the 7-8 grade camp will be held at the middle school.

The Superstars competition will be held Friday night.

The Braves will be off next week because of the Jackson County Fair before beginning practice on July 31.

May will be inducted into the Indiana Football Coaches Association Hall of Fame at 6:30 p.m. Aug. 4 at Blevins Memorial Stadium, followed by the red-black scrimmage.

The Braves will scrimmage at Jennings County on Aug. 11.