Total Program Football 7th to Seniors Part 1

The first time I heard of a program running the same offense and defense at the lower levels was in the book Friday Night Lights by H. G. Bissinger.  He was describing that the football players at Permian High School were running the same plays since POP Warner Football.  Fast Forward to my first football meeting of my very first job as a Junior High Coach in Copperas Cove Texas. Coach Jack Welch who I have learned so much from I have adapted his blue print to my own about program building.   Before he became the head football coach at Copperas Cove they were everybody’s homecoming game.  They did have some great individual talent but there are lots of programs across the state of Texas that has four plus Division One Scholarship players and they are sitting home come play-off time.  What makes Copperas Cove so special is the ability to turn program kids into very good high school football players.  There are several factors that led to this:

1. Alignment of Staff in the summer while I was working at Copperas Cove we always had a coaches retreat.  Not the usual work 1-2 hours a day if any.  But we put in a good at least 9-5 day with competitive games afterward volleyball, tennis, poker, ect.  The varsity coaches would put us on the white board make us explain the X's and O's and also make us teach and explain drills.  The objective of the whole thing was to make sure that the same drill and coaching cues used by 7th grade Receivers Coach  is the same as the Varsity Receivers Coach they both were saying the same things.  
2. The Progression in Copperas Cove 7th grade ran the 4-3 and were taught all of that package that the varsity used with that front with the exceptions of Defensive Line Twists.  8th grade a Eagle Front, Freshmen a 4-2-5 and 3-3 Stack, and Junior Varsity a 3-4 front was added.  There was a lot of carry over from each front.  Our get your best athlete but as intelligent athlete on the field was out End who always lined up in a 5 to the open side.     
3. Strength and Conditioning since I had played at Southwest Texas and for a time Larry Levermann was my strength coach I became our Junior High's Strength and Conditioning which meant I worked worked all summer for free but learned how to coach power clean (which is one of the most under coached lifts in football but that is for a latter blog).  Our District strength coach really taught me how to teach the power clean and expected me to teach all of the Junior High Athletes how to power clean which we did there was like 35 freshmen who were 185lb plus in the power clean that year.  
4. Our Discipline was also aligned if we had an athlete miss practice we used the same procedures that the high school used.  
5. The expectations of the staff were also aligned we got a blue pocket folder with our duties who we were responsible for academically what equipment we were required to take out and put up after practice every day.  We were also suppose to make calls to our athletes parents and let them know how they were doing in school, practice, any discipline issues etc every week.

I also worked in Pearland for coach Tony Heath he is very similar to what Coach Welch did at Copperas Cove.  Pearland also was on a lot of home coming schedules.  And in 2010 they were the 5A state champs. Both with Coach Heath and Coach Welch they were very important to me as developing into a Coach, Christian, and a Man and I have thanked God for having put them in my life.