It's the half of the offense that Chiefs head coach Tim Baechler repeatedly refers to as the team's MVP, and opposing coaches rave about during post-game interviews.

The players on this half of the offense never get their names or pictures in the paper (until now), but they don't seem to care.

Their egos are as small as their hearts are large.

They're big, bright and "bring-it-on" confident, but not trash-talking cocky.

They are "Dave," the singular generic name given to the Chiefs' offensive line by its position coach, Bob Williams, a veteran of 17 seasons at Canton.

"I always refer to my offensive-line unit as 'Dave,'" Williams explained. "If somebody screws up, Dave did it. If we make a nice play, Dave did it. The O-line is like one big generic football player that works in machine-like fashion. Dave is our generic collective name for the unit. The kids are really into it and it gives them one more thing to kid around about."

'Dave' divided by 5

This year's "Dave" consists of tackles Eric Kilijanczyk and Kevin Pruett; guards Matt D'Avanzo and Russ Bruner; and center Mitch Miller.

If you take the average heights and weights of Canton's five starting senior offensive linemen, "Dave" stands a hair under 6-foot-1 and he weighs in at 233 pounds.

His grade-point average is honor roll-caliber and his weight-room exploits are off the charts.

Bruner is the only returning starter on this year's offensive line.

"The rest of us were all on the scout team last season," Kilijanczyk noted. "We worked hard and waited for our opportunity."

Talk about making the best of an opportunity.

When I asked the group Monday afternoon who its leader was, Kilijanczyk, Pruett, D'Avanzo and Miller all pointed to the 6-1, 220-pound Bruner, one of the Chiefs' four captains.

"We're all leaders," Bruner said, brushing off his teammates' praise like he would a scrawny defensive tackle. "We're one unit."

No ink, no problem

Miller, who has the responsibility of calling out the unit's blocking scheme before every snap, said the lack of recognition he and his co-linemen receive is not important. Those who know what's really going on between the sidelines appreciate the work they do, he said.

"The lack of recognition goes with the territory of being an offensive lineman," Miller said, as his four peers nodded in agreement. "Our coaches and teammates know how hard we work. When one of our backs scores, he'll come over and thank us or give us a high five.

"And coach Williams bought us all the pizza we could eat after one of our games. He must have appreciated what we did because we can eat a lot of pizza."

While the members of "Dave" are fun-loving and comical off the field, they're all business once the games start.

By the second quarter of most games this season, they've left their opposing defensive linemen muttering to themselves. Canton has mercied all but one opponent this season.

Creating exhaustion

"Our offense tends to wear teams down after awhile, and they get frustrated," Pruett said.

"You can feel them giving in sometimes because our offense just slams the ball right at them," Kilijanczyk added. "The defensive linemen start talking to themselves sometimes."

"Yeah, you'll hear them say, 'Oh, man!'" Miller chimed in. "And when they get really worn down and tired, they say things you can't print in the newspaper."

One of the down sides of being an offensive lineman is that you can get so into finishing off your blocks and containing your opponent that you rarely get to see the end result - the running back or quarterback scoring a touchdown.

"A lot of times I can feel the running back going by me," D'Avanzo said. "Then the guy I'm blocking will turn and start running the other way, towards our end zone, chasing the back. That's when I know I've made a good block."

That scenario has unfolded on a consistent basis this season for Canton's football team, thanks largely to "Dave," the team's humble, hard-working star, who you, too, would enjoy meeting - assuming it's not a Friday night and you're not lined up against him on a football field.

Ed Wright is the sports editor for the Plymouth and Canton Observers. He can be reached at (734) 953-2108 or ewright@oe.homecomm.net.