There were plenty of positive themes from ADM football’s narrow win over Perry in the season opener last Friday, including the front seven’s ability to pressure the quarterback and the relative ease with which the offense moved the ball, to name a few.

One other positive – if not unexpected – development from the win was ADM’s ability to rotate between a deep group of running backs.

It was though heading into the season returning starter Blake Crannell would receive the bulk of the carries, and that could still be the case in the long run.

In the interim, head coach Mike Whisner, who has run the spread offense at ADM for more than a decade, must feel like a kid in a candy store. He has the luxury to choose between seniors Zach Johnston and Crannell, junior Matt Dobrzynski and sophomore Nick Lindgren, all of whom carried the ball against Perry.

“The big thing that I looked at was the depth at running back that we had. Each running back we had – we have four of them we’ve been rotating – they have their own thing that they’re really good at,” Whisner said. “Crannell’s really good at receiving right out of the backfield. Zach’s a really physical runner. Dobrzysnki, he just goes and he’ll find a hole and scoot through it, and Lindgren, he’s very patients, sits, blocks set up and then he squirts out.

“It’s interesting – we haven’t had four running backs in a long time, and so we’re looking forward to seeing how that all unravels because we’ll use all four if we have to.”

The Tigers (1-0) continue non-district play against Ballard at 7:30 p.m. Friday night in Adel, a game that can be heard live on K107 and raccoonvalleyradio.com.