The high school football season is winding down with the playoffs about to begin. The Trojans team didn’t go to the playoffs, but they weren’t expected to even win as many games as they did.
Most teams after changing coaches don’t win any games.
I am going to go out on a limb and say the boys were able to win because of the sound coaching. (3-6 overall, 2-5 Sunset League) I know you are making a face, sound coaching your saying. Well yes, our record does not reflect how good our team really was.
To come back from losing a coach like former Trojans coach Joe Clayton and to do as well as we did is the mark of sound coaching. Come on, our team had to learn a new system – a spread offense to boot. That’s not easy to do. In the Pacific 12, three years ago, the California Bears took on new coach Sonny Dykes, (who just so happens runs the same offense as our Trojans – hint – Gent borrowed it from them) and his team didn’t win a single PAC 12 game in his first year.
So that’s why it takes good coaching and the players have to have a good football knowledge to do this. Our boys had that and were able to pick up the system – an air raid type offense.
Pahrump teaches our kids football at an early age and we owe that to Joe Clayton. He started Pop Warner in this town and then he introduced his system to the middle school.
Trojans coach Adam Gent recognizes that it’s important to start the kids young. So right there we have a coach that understands how to win at the high school level.
You really didn’t think that championship football teams at the high school level just slop a team together and then play football for nine games and that’s it?
No – it takes years of preparation.
Case in point, look at Pahranagat Valley who has not lost a football game since 2009. This team may be a Division IV team but they have recognized that teams have to start grooming kids at a young age.
They not only do this at the Pop Warner level but they use the same coaches all the way through to high school and so when they get to high school they are using a system that they have used from day one. Their kids know how to run block, pass block and how to tackle before they get to the high school level. Schools like this win state championships.
To get to that level must be the goal of every coach if he wants to win – that’s a given.
If you go in with that approach from day one, that’s half the battle.
Gent understands this, and that’s why he will be successful. He has made a point of visiting with Pop Warner and the middle school and now it’s up to those programs to understand what is necessary, which involves a bit of swallowing the ego for the common good – football excellence.
Contact sports editor Vern Hee at vhee@pvtimes.com. Find him on Twitter: @vernheepvt.