Coach Troy Mott uses Saturday mornings for a film session and light conditioning for the Napa High School football team.

Mott added a walk-through to Napa’s workload Saturday, as the Indians (3-2 overall) continued their preparations for this week’s Monticello Empire League opener against Vacaville (4-1 overall). Friday’s game has a 7:30 p.m. start at Tom Zunino Stadium. Comcast Hometown Network (Channel 104), Comcast’s regional cable network which is produced by Comcast and covering Northern and Central California, will televise the Napa-Vacaville game. It will be shown on Saturday at 7 p.m.

Last week was an offweek for Napa, as the Indians had a bye date in their schedule due to opening the 2011 season with a zero week game in August. But they were plenty busy, using the week to condition and lift hard and game plan for Vacaville, while trying to get as healed up as best they can at this point in the season.

“We need to make sure that we play on an even keel and understand that sometimes things aren’t going to go our way, whether it be a penalty, a missed assignment, a dropped ball, a fumble, whatever that may be,” Mott said over the weekend. “We have to learn to stay the course and play through anything negative that happens to us. On the other end of that, we have to make sure that we don’t get too high when good things happen to us.

“We just have to play from the first snap to the last with the same sort of intensity, which should be a high intensity. There’s a lot of plays, a lot of snaps in any given game, and we need to make sure that we are prepared, physically and mentally for each and every snap.”

Vacaville is on a roll coming into the MEL season. The Bulldogs have played a very tough nonleague schedule and have wins over Granite Bay (38-27), Valley Christian-San Jose (41-27), and Deer Valley-Antioch (48-21). They started off the year with a blowout of Rodriguez-Cordelia (61-27), then lost in Week 2 to Marin Catholic-Kentfield (33-29).

Mott was on hand to see Vacaville — No. 8 in the CalHiSports.com CIF Division II North bowl rankings — play last week.

“It’s a good football team,” he said. “They play with a lot of energy and intensity, and they play at a high tempo. They do a really good job of coaching all three of their levels (special teams, defense, offense). They’re a very good football program. We’re certainly looking forward to that challenge and we’re eager to prepare this week and get ourselves ready mentally and physically for a great football game.”

Vacaville does a very good job running the ball. Melvin Mason leads the Bulldogs with 723 rushing yards and 11 touchdowns. Curtis Goins has 555 yards rushing and seven TDs.

Napa lost its last game, falling on the road to Antioch, 40-35.

“We are still in the process of sort of finding ourselves,” said Mott. “Sometimes when we have breakdowns, we have to be willing and able to play through anything negative that happens to us. At times in the season we have. That showed at Beyer and it showed at Antioch.”