If ever a team needed a scrimmage to measure where it stands before the season, perhaps Bowling Green needed it last week against Male.

New starting quarterback Beau Buchanan threw for 251 yards and four touchdowns to a spread of receivers who ran circles around the Bulldogs defense. Speaking of defense, the Purples held Class 6A Male to 157 yards during the varsity portion.

For that brief exhibition, coach Kevin Wallace was surprised. Then practice followed, and the Purples were back to inconsistencies they’ve dealt with all summer. Such might be expected for a team replacing Mr. Football, a starting quarterback with 44 touchdown passes and an all-state wide receiver.

By the coach’s standards, Bowling Green has a lot of work to do.

“I was pleasantly surprised with how we played, but you come back and watch Tuesday’s practice and it looked like we regressed,” Wallace said. “Once we can hit a plain where we look about the same day-to-day, I’ll have an idea of what kind of team I’ve got. Right now, it scares me that I’ve got a team that resembles a bad stock market going up and down. I don’t think that’s good for anybody.”

The Purples enter 2017 coming off a 15-0 campaign last season with the program’s fifth Class 5A state championship in the last six years. Bowling Green has a 27-game win streak and ranks No. 1 in 5A in every preseason poll.

But graduated players like quarterback Clark Payne (Centre College), Jamale Carothers (Naval Academy) and Deangelo Wilson (Austin Peay) aren’t walking out of the Purples’ locker room this season.

The keys are handed to Buchanan, who backed up Payne the last two seasons, and DeVito Tisdale at running back after playing as a defensive back and kick/punt returner last year. The offense, which ranked second in the state last year at 47.9 points per game, only returns receiver Ziyon Kenner and offensive linemen Matthew McCathron and Sam Vitale.

How a new offensive line holds up to allow Buchanan to spread the ball to the speedsters will be tested early with North Hardin, Pleasure Ridge Park, St. Xavier and Owensboro to open the season. Nathan Briley, Jake Wilson and Cam Withrow fill out the rest of the new offensive line.

The Purples kick off the year against North Hardin in the Rafferty’s Bowl at 8 p.m. Saturday at Houchens-Smith Stadium.

“We’re learning what we’re supposed to do and what kind of effort it takes to play at an elite level,” Wallace said of the inconsistencies on offense. “We’re learning how to react to adversity and when you’re dealing with guys who don’t have any experience and never been out there to do it, sometimes those things take a little while to gel. We’re finding that has led to a lot of inconsistency up front, but that inconsistency is also in other places.”

Wallace compares the preparation for 2017 to the summers of 2012 and 2014. Those were summers following state championship teams with a senior-heavy class. Along with the three seniors returning on offense, just four return to the defense.

Linebacker will be the most experienced position with seniors Justice Dingle, J’son Beason and Devan Jackson all returning. Junior safety Davis Tomblinson is the lone returning starter in the secondary.

“It’s been a rebuilding process,” Jackson said. “We have a few starters back, so this year we’re kind of iffy. After our first scrimmage, we feel pretty good about ourselves.”

The linebackers bring a stability to a defense that demanded attention with 6-foot-2, 230-pound defensive lineman Dalan Cofer constantly drawing double teams.

Bowling Green’s three new defensive linemen are juniors William Gray, Jacob Ellis and senior Terrion Thompson.

“It puts a lot of pressure on Justice and J’son inside because they may get some more bodies into them blocking them than they were accustomed to,” Wallace said. “I think on the edges we’re good and our secondary has been a little inconsistent, but I think we’re going to get solid play there. … If we can just not get road graded off the line of scrimmage, I think we have a chance to be good on defense.”

2017 Bowling Green schedule

8/19 – North Hardin at WKU

8/25 – at PRP

9/1 – St. Xavier

9/8 – Owensboro

9/15 – Warren Central

9/22 – at Greenwood

9/29 – at Grayson County

10/13 – Barren County

10/20 – South Warren

10/27 – at Bullitt Central{&end}