Low turnout forced Sedona Red Rock High School to cancel its preseason football scrimmage Saturday, Aug. 13, at Page High School.

“We just didn’t have enough guys to do it,” said second-year Scorpions head coach John Bradshaw. “We had, like, 14 cleared to play, and I’m not going to go out there with 14.”

Although the number of players signed up for the team is more than double that amount, at least five of them won’t be available for Bradshaw to suit up by 5 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 18, for the Purple and White intrasquad scrimmage.

“If all the guys that say they’re going to show up, show up, we should have a decent intrasquad game,” he said. “I’ll only have to put a couple of freshmen in there.”

With less than 10 days until the regular season home opener Friday, Aug. 26, against St. Johns High School, Bradshaw hopes he will not have to be serious about that last remark.

“We’ve got 30 [players] signed up officially,” he said. “Any given day, we have around 22 to 25 that have been showing up.”

The scrimmage will be the only tune-up to the season, which Bradshaw knows puts this fall’s team at a disadvantage compared to most others.

“Most of the guys we have are returners,” he said. “It’s not as terrible as we thought it was going to be. We have a solid returner in every position.”

That amounts to 19 varsity players — a number to which he hopes to add at least three more who can suit up by Aug. 26.

The only certain starter at the skill positions is senior quarterback and punter Chas Rescigno. Otherwise, Bradshaw said, it’s a toss-up among five new players in the backfield.

That group includes senior backup quarterback Dawson Barber and two other seniors, Luke Doerner and Neil Smith, in a crowded but highly inexperienced wide receiver corps.

The picture is slightly clearer but only slightly less green among running backs, where seniors Xavier Turnbull and Kevin Zarate own the best varsity statistics heading into the scrimmage. Junior Javier Pacheco is also in the mix.

“To be honest, I’m not sure who the starters are going to be yet,” he said. “We have five new players in the backfield. I’ve still got to figure out who’s going to play where.”

But the surprise of the fall may be a Swedish exchange student, senior Daniel Bouvim. Bradshaw projects the soccer-style kicker to handle kickoffs, field goals and extra points.

“We call him ‘Sunshine,’ because of his long, blonde hair,” Bradshaw said. “He’s pretty much a man, so we’ve just got to figure out where he’s playing.”

Bradshaw is already excited as well about the possibilities of the six-foot, four-inch Bouvim starting at middle linebacker — especially alongside the six-foot, three-inch Rescigno and junior James Suarez.

“They can jump, like, 10 feet in the air,” he said. “No balls are going over the middle, I can tell you that.”