What does it take to win?

The staff I am apart of now took over a program that was 8-85 the previous 10 years prior to our arrival. It was in horrible shape. Some of them didnt even know what a 3 point stance was! Year 1 was all about changing the mindset/culture (finished 2-8). Year 2 was starting to learn how to compete with oppoenents (finished 3-7, but could have been 5-5). This year, with the talent we have coming back, we have the potentional to shock alot of people. Due to the fact we made a decision to play our best kids during year 1 and 2 even if they were frosh and sophmores cause we knew it would benefit later on.) I can also tell you that if you lay down the discipline in the program, you are going to get quite a few that will jump ship. We went from 34 kids on varsity to 20 by the end of 2 a days during year 1 because we established the fact to them and the community that things are going to be done our way. Notice in my sig line "those who stay, will be champions" is a sign that is posted in our lockeroom.

1. Change the culture including: players attitudes, coaches expectations, discipline, practice methods, academic standards. Hold them accountable! Emphasize doing things the right way (even though you may take your lumps at first). From my experience anyway, it is usually more than just changing a football team's mindset, but an entire community because they havent been used to winning in awhile. Do NOT compromise your values for no one. Be demanding but, and this is very important, let them know you care. Once they know you care, they will run through a wall for ya.

2. You need support from the administration. If the Admin.'s (AD, Prinicipal, etc) aren't committed to a solid athletic program you may be doomed.

3. This could be #2 but an excellent strength & conditioning program. Mental and physical toughness is built Febuary-July.

4. Identify a core group of kids (Regardless of grade level) and build your program around them. Demand more of them and develop them as leaders.

4. From an X and O's standpoint. Put in something simple enough for them to pick up and more importantly something you know and have the answers for. If you know your team may struggle physically against teams, consider schemes unconviential to the league/conference/teams you are playing (i.e. option, full house T, throw alot, etc.) . I cant take credit for this one, I got this from spreadattack's blog which makes perfect sense. Year 1 for our staff, we thought we could out scheme everyone with all this tricky b.s. schemes. Didnt work, so we went to our beliefs and just ran a hell of a lot of Power O, Counter, and Iso and tried to get good at something.

5. Embrace the traditions of the past but don't be afraid to put your stamp on the program. We have one legendary ex-head coach from our program who had numerous undefeated seasons. We have had him come in multiple times to speak to the kids or just hang around practice. Our first 2 classes that have graduated (from our staff), a good number of them will stop by practice throughout the year to just say hi. Some of them even want to help out the program and ill give them scouting jobs, filming, charting, etc. Also on our website, we have the yearbook pages of every single team in the history of our program since the 1950s.

6. Hire quality assistants. When I interviewed with the HC of the staff I am apart of now, he said he only plans on hiring coaches who A) want to be head coaches eventually or B) are former head coaches. Hire guys that are self starters, fundamentalist, and support your vision. The very first HC I worked for, who was very successful and recieved state coach of the year award almost refused to accept the award because he believed he was only as good as his assistants.

7. Don't remind them about how bad they were in the past. They know it, their families know it, and so does the rest of the community. Focus on nothing but the now and the future. On day 1, you need to start teaching like they have never heard of the game of football.

nice post. I know there have been quite a few good threads about this topic lately. Always a great subject.

work ethic

It was agreat post. I passed it on to the members of our staff. I've heard :Everything you see is either COACHED or it is ALLOWED. Which one is it for your team? I love it.

The problem that we face is what the kids do in school. We follow the everything you see philosophy, but the school does not. In fact our school district is so lacking in discipline that it is hard for a kid who is a saint to do the right thing. When we have them, they are great. The HC is about to blow a gasket.

If you're going to change the culture you have to be willing to take the hits. You're going to have to sit some good athletes who aren't doing it the right way.

That's why administrative support is the key. At some places the school board and/or bosses will cave to public pressure to play "Junior" or "the best players". They may fire the coach if he doesn't.

If you get fired under those circumstances go willingly.

I think I posted this before... years ago.

<sup>The #1 thing you have to gain is their respect. If you don't have that then you are pi$$in up a rope and nothing will ever change.
Once you have it then:

Lay DOWN the LAW and stick to it. You are going no where without discipline. You can get some wins with some athletes but you'll never have anything stable or sustainable if you have no control of them.</sup>


Very true.

When I took over a job at a big school in CO,they had come off a 1-9 season and 11 straight losing seasons (3 0-10s during that time)

We went to camp (arrived one day early) and set our camp, off season and season goals. Our season goal was: Make the playoffs. This had been done once in 26 years at this school. One of our camp goals was be on time for everything- the team was to run 1 gasser (sideline to sideline) for each person late. They set this rule- I did not.

Anyway, first day of camp, we have 23 guys late to the initial meeting. I said nothing until our team time (45 minutes). At team time I lined everyone up and told them we would run our 23 during this practice segment.

Several said "But coach-we don't know our offense or defense yet and we scrimmage this afternoon"

All I said was this: "You are right. We need to work our offense and defense. But this was your goal and we failed to reach it... and this was your punishment. My job is to enforce this- but if you do not want to, then we won't. HOWEVER- if we do not follow our camp goals, we will not make our season goal- so we need to change that first. Decide that now- run our 23 and move on, or work on Offense and change our season goal to WIN ONE GAME."

They grumbled... but ran them all.

In our first scrimmage we ran base D and ran a FB dive every play (and were soundly crushed). But I do think they "got it" that day.

By the way, we lost 13-7 in the state semi-final that year.

That story sticks with me because after that day at camp, I knew we had a chance to turn things around.

Good insights everyone. I have seen similar post before and plan to use many strategies towards our team next season.

And for those who have not learned/figured it out by now. If you see post or threads by DCOHIO, take them to heart. Great knowledge and prospectives all the time.

A few other things;

-One of your overall goals needs to be to get kids out and keep numbers high. If you've get a lot of kids out for football and you keep them out, than that means you're developing enthusiasm for football and for the program. If you're numbers are high, then the program has a positive vibe to it, versus a negative one.

-If you want to increase your numbers, then you need to get as many kids playing time as possible in those lower levels. Treat your freshman and JV programs as developmental and get the kids in there. This is assuming, of course, that the kids have met practice and academic requirements. In our program, everyone at the lower levels gets a minimum of one series and we do our best to get them in during the first half. Our kids understand that if that if they work hard and get better, they'll get more playing time. If they waste time and are lazy, they'll only get (on average) 3-5 plays.

-You have to be prepared to reward hard work long before you reward talent, ESPECIALLY AT THE LOWER LEVELS. I don't care how talented a kid is, if he doesn't want to work hard, hit the weights, and do the things you ask of him, then he shouldn't be playing. If you do play him, you may win a few more games, but it's a short term solution to a long term problem.