Spring Insider: Six things you should know about the Sailors

Six things you should know about the Sailors:

1. They expect to be better than last year.
“With so many people coming back, we’re all holding a real high goal for ourselves, to go further than the second round,” quarterback Andrew McDonald said. “We all expect to do better.”

2. They learned a lot from their highs (beating Los Alamitos, 31-27) and their lows (47-0 loss to Edison) last season.
“We learned that after you win a big game, you can’t stick on that,” offensive lineman Peter Kinney said.

3. They like being the underdog.
“I’d rather being an underdog because once you win you can say, ‘Look what we did,’ ” McDonald said. “Underdog is not always a bad thing."

“I definitely feel like everyone’s like, ‘It’s just Newport Harbor, a bunch of beach guys,’ ” Kinney said. “If we’re the underdog, we’ll come out every Thursday or Friday night and show we’re not just a bunch of beach bums, that we can play football.”

4. Players to watch:

• OL Scott Ward

• TE/LB Ned Lyon

5. Areas of need: offensive line, defensive line

6. Areas of strength: wide receiver, defensive back

Contact the writer: amaya@ocregister.com