001good evening ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the first coach's corner presented by houlton meats alex schlemmer along with coach horner here and coach entering into your 21st season what are what are you thinking about tomorrow night you got a game what's going through your head right now oh it's a lot of a lot of unknown at this point like it is every year in week one you know not only unknown from the standpoint of your own team but when your opponent has a brand new head coach there's just a lot of unknowns and uh you know i think our kids have been preparing i think we're ready but you just don't really know until you get out there the first game so we're excited to get started get going yeah absolutely we're we're pretty
002excited here this is something that we've never done before this we've tried the coach's corner a couple years ago we went up to bacardi's did a little coaches talk kind of deal and this year we've made it official the school districts got us some more gear so what we had last year we're building off of it and going a little bit step farther so a little bit about last year like we were saying i'm coming off that 5-1 season graduated about 15 seniors but in typical columbia fashion put up 224 points on offense only gave up 85 on defense you're gonna try to build on that again this year you're gonna have that same mindset or well yeah i mean anytime you score more than they do it's usually it's a good situation yeah definitely
003a good situation so uh you know we've been fortunate enough uh the years past to have a lot of great athletes that can score points and you know uh one thing that's going to be different for us this year is uh you know in the last couple years we've had some really great athletes and we've got some good ones out there again this year but uh it's hard to replace the kid like number 28 london little you know three year starter for us but uh yeah we're going to build off of that we did lose a lot of seniors with 15 of them gone and and only having 10 uh seniors this year mixed in with about i think eight or nine juniors uh we've got a lot of guys that are gonna be playing
004their first snap on friday night uh varsity football so uh i'm sure there's gonna be a little bit of a little bit of nerves and um you know they're just gonna have to get in and get the feet wet absolutely yeah you eventually got to have that first snap and i think me and jared have talked about that in previous years where you're nervous you just got to get that first snap in and then after that you just play football the game that you've played for some of these guys their entire life but you mentioned london little scoring 11 touchdowns last year but that doesn't count i mean i think he had one throwing running punt return kick return kicked the field goal kicked the p-80 it's kind of that's not somebody that you replace
005you're gonna have to try to you gotta might have to get three or four guys to try to make that void yeah that's exactly it you don't replace a guy like that with another guy and uh i mean certainly would be awesome if you could but uh you know we've got a lot of we got a lot of guys that know their role and uh what different guys stepping in different positions this year and and um you know as difficult as it is i think our guys are up for the challenge we we have a a good core of seniors that did play last year and and and so they know what to to expect and they're going to help these little these younger guys along and you know you know uh it's their time
006to shine it's it's that's just the way it is you know your senior year is a special year for you and it's not about what happened last year or what might happen in years to come it's about what's going to happen right now for them and i'm excited for them to get on the field so now we'll we'll flip into this year uh schedule going back to the nine nine team schedule again cahokia conference we'll talk about in a couple weeks goku conference is going to make a couple changes uh week one though we got 628 as our official enrollment according to the ihsa so we're going in week one against moscow week two like always we got waterloo and then you're gonna have to help me out here i think then it goes to
007marquette that's correct then what do you got salem the middle of the schedule is different for the first time in about 15 years for me so i even have to look at that but uh you know i think the i think the thing that that'll be interesting to see how we respond to is how tough our schedule is this year uh and no disrespect to people we played in the past but a lot of smaller schools have been on our schedule in the past in the conference and now that they're not there anymore we replace them with schools our size so we're playing uh we're playing three 5a schools and one 4a school on our non-conference schedule and then everybody else that's on our conference schedule is a 4a school so certainly it's the the
008the appearance of the schedule is a lot different than what it has been in the past i think if you're looking at it on paper it's definitely going to be a more challenging schedule than what it's been in the past so so that's going to pose you know you have to play every week for us and that's going to be something a little different yeah typically you get half time into the game and you're kind of trying to figure out hey how are we going to get some substitutes in here and you know in the postseason that comes down to hurt you you look back at prairie central you didn't have much adversity throughout the season you get into that week 11 game you get a little bit of adversity and guys almost came back
009but it's going to be something like you said it's going to be different you're going to face adversity every week you're going to face some tougher opponents and it's going to be interesting to watch and hopefully it keeps everybody involved in the games as much too yeah we've got to stay healthy you know when you have to play every week like that especially against big schools teams that are you know they're going to be going to match your size and your speed uh you certainly uh you know you hope you stay healthy that's going to be a big part of it but you know the great thing about playing a tough schedule is that you know that you've been battle tested if you can somehow squeeze out five or six or however many wins you
010want to get to make the playoffs you know you've been battle tested and you're ready for that for that week 10 that week 11 opponent whenever you especially if you've got to travel so we're excited for the challenge i think the kids are up for it they've prepared and we're ready to lace it up tomorrow night just about uh about 24 hours from now you'll be lacing it up so this year we'll talk about the roster we got like i said coming off the 15 seniors lost this year coming back though we got 10 seniors this year so that's i mean at least you're retaining some of the numbers juniors like you said eight or nine a lot of new guys coming in starting new positions defensively just looking at you only have three returning
011starters coach germaine had this ready three returning starters dom vagley the junior for his third year then you've got jay mistler coming back as a second year starter he's a senior he'll be an inside linebacker and you've got defensive end owen brewer he's a second year senior starter and then after that like you said you might have a bunch of guys that are taking their first snaps junior senior sophomore whatever it may be you're switching it all up there yeah i mean it's great to have 15 seniors and and you know 2019 we graduated 16 or 17 seniors and you know uh it's it's great to have that many but whenever you have that many a lot of times your juniors are the ones that are that haven't had they don't get a lot of
012opportunity um you know and and so there will be a lot of seniors this year that will be on the on the field for the first time uh but again you know the they've played against those seniors last year in practice every day so you know they've been tested a little bit uh you know there are some guys out here that are gonna that are gonna see their uh their first varsity snaps even as seniors uh you know first varsity snaps that are not in a game that's out of hand you know a game where it's really meaningful and so it'll be interesting um but uh you know we're looking forward to it but you know it's gonna take some time there's no question about it so we'll talk about this offensively because i ask
013you this question every week coach what's your key to the game and you're gonna tell me every week got to control the trenches got to control the line of scrimmage so it's football that's what football is so everybody needs to be prepared for that that'll be the coach's key this year but uh defensively you're looking there you've got first year first year second year and only coming in at about 210 215 averaging on your your defense alignment there so the way our defense is set up the lineman shouldn't get all the tackles it should be the linebackers it should be the defensive lineman here and there but linebacker wise what are you expecting jay mistler in there said his name a lot last year is he going to be anchoring you down in the middle
014of the field this year yeah definitely i mean you know jay's a a kid that that saw considerable action uh not only offensively but defensively last year so he's going to be the guy in the middle that's that's going to have to he's going to do a lot for us no question about it and he you know as inside linebackers you know your hope is that they're in on just about every tackle so that's going to be really important but you know our kids have bought into our style and our style is um you know it's a lot about team defense it's it's not about you being the guy that makes the tackle all the time it might be about you setting up the play for somebody else to make the tackle and uh yeah
015that's a key part and that's hard for kids uh high school kids especially because everybody wants the stats everybody wants to get recruited everybody wants to to be the guy that hears their name on the on the microphone and all that and it's hard to buy in but these kids have you know they've been easy to coach they're eager to learn you know and and so i'm excited from that regard but you know there are a lot of kids that are seeing their first snaps and like i said there'll be some challenges but but we like we like the guys we have out there you know we have those three returning starters that you talked about but if i you know i don't know touching on a few of the other ones you know we
016kyle mcconaughey who's who's going to see obviously a considerable amount of time on offense he did last year uh he's a kid that we didn't have to play on defense last year uh but this year he's gonna have to play some defense and so we're excited about him he's a great athlete he's a great competitor so we're excited about that we've got uh a transfer student uh in in carter hicks who's you know he's a six five 210 pound kid that you know he immediately steps on the field and he helps you just because of his size he's looking at him and uh you know he he's uh i know he's excited to get in there and we're excited about that you know um so you know from there you know a lot of the
017other guys you know brandon jackson will spend some time inside linebacker it's going to be new for him he's a sophomore uh maybe a little raw but he's a tough kid and uh you know i've had both of my corners this year with with you know losing the little kid last year who was our lockdown guy uh you know having uh jarvis and meganson both at the corners i i feel pretty good about it they've done really well in practice so we feel really good about that and you know another team doesn't score you can't lose so no pressure coach germain i don't know if there's an official stat on this but last year it seemed like we had a defensive turn or a defensive turnover i guess you'd call it take away or a
018uh a touchdown on the special team side of the ball somebody like you said you lose london little obviously he's a special team guy but andrew malding i think he had four or five picks last year and it just seemed like he was everywhere he was a quiet kid that you didn't hear a lot about but whenever you did he was making some pretty big plays so that's obviously going to be something that's going to hurt and again you just got to try to replace that guy so now we switch over to the offensive side of the ball um eight guys going both both ways this year which isn't something that we've seen lately out of a columbia team but with i mean only i think 35 guys on the team this year you're going
019to have to have some of those guys going both ways and hopefully guys are ready for that this year it's going to be a challenge especially with the weather it's certainly a concern but again these guys have been training all during camp and and we think we're ready uh but it is tough you don't like to have eight guys going both ways and and you know that's what the starting the starting uh offense and defensive sheets say obviously as the game progresses you get into you know second quarter or so you know guys are going to be tired especially with the weather so you know there's some other guys that that we're we're not necessarily talking about or writing on the paper that'll be in dispel these guys and give them a break uh kind
020of has to operate that way you know we've said all along and every coach will tell you that you know you might have a kid that's more talented than another kid but whenever that talented kid gets tired uh he becomes less talented than the kid that's that's standing on the sideline fresh so we're not scared to use some of those other kids knowing that that some of our kids are going to get tired and you know but we're but we're excited about our offense you know moving uh moving mcconaughey out to wide receiver you got vaguely back got brewer back on the offensive line uh matheny who played some some quality minutes last year is going to anchor our line at the center position so you know we feel pretty good about it all right
021well we just dove into the little bit of the offense we're going to hit a break we'll come back we'll dive right back into the offense and then we'll go on with some more coaches stats and we'll look into the week one match up against the mosquito indians we will be back to the holton meets coaches corner after this welcome back to the coach's corner presented by houlton meats here at aces wild alex schlemmer and coach horner uh go back into the offensive side of the ball again four new receivers this year i'm seeing on the on the play sheet here on what we have written down um you're still going to be led by dominic vaguely the junior quarterback uh you're going to move mcconaughey from running back to receiver potentially i'm sure he
022could probably he could go anywhere he's a good enough athlete for that he's our backup quarterback also in the back up quarterback i don't think he's going to be on the line is he no definitely not that not on the line all right so speaking of the line coming in averaging 6 2 2 30. not too bad i wasn't really expecting something like that when i was looking at the stat sheet at first or the roster at first but then once you you add everything up we do have a little bit of size this year that can hopefully control the line of scrimmage i took a word from a phrase away from you yeah that's right yeah well uh you know the name of the game is controlling the line of scrimmage you can't get
023anything done if you can't control the line scrimmage and you know we're gonna have a tall task there's no question about it mosquitoes guys will be big they'll be aggressive they're always strong and quick and you know everything everything you want and all those kind of football players but we do have a little bit of size um we never have a ton of size anyway i mean when you look at the just the numbers and how much we weigh but most times our kids are pretty good at getting off the ball and getting into people and maintaining blocks long enough to give our skill kids a chance to to go make plays so um yeah just talking a little bit more about some of those guys you know owen brewer i can't say enough great
024things about this kid and there's a there's a lot of great kids out there but this is a kid that you want to talk about training all summer you want to talk about being in great shape and you know he's a quiet kid he didn't say much he loves to be coached and and he's hard-nosed as can be so he's really going to be the guy that's going to anchor a lot of things for us uh you know our center and grant matthew he'll be our emotional kind of guy you know sometimes uh he lets his emotions get to him but that's not a bad thing you know for me i want those guys that are emotional as long as they can control it um you know and and uh those two guys are going
025to be our guys that really kind of kind of set the stage for us on the offensive line and you know we do have a tom kingstein coming back after starting a little bit last year as a as a sophomore so he's got experience he's a big kid he's still trying to i think figure it out but but i think he's almost there so we really like those guys and then jason kuczynski who's going to be a first year starter guy again quiet kid and he's tough and he's not real big but he'll get after you and so we like that about him and and mason schnabel is another kid that uh you know he kind of surprised us last year as a sophomore when he'd come into games for us and played on the
026defensive line and and he's grown two three inches and put on about 40 pounds in the offseason just because he's you know maturing and getting bigger and so um i look for him to to be a special kid for us too and then you know obviously can't say enough about our quarterback i've been starting since he's a freshman the only kid in my 28-year coaching career that i've ever started uh as a freshman and not because i had to but because he was good enough to play and uh you know he's just that kind of special kid and he showed it last year at the quarterback position and obviously on defense as well he's kind of that it factor kind of guy and uh and we like elijah jarvis too he's not very big as
027our running back but uh he runs hard he does run hard he's only about 145 pounds but i feel like he runs like he's you know 185 or 190s again he's not a kid that's not scared but you know one of the other running backs that's not on the list jeremiah biltman will see some time uh whenever elijah needs a break and and he's a little short guys not real big but he is kind of stocky uh he's got great vision good feet and and so i think he'll do some great things for us and then the receiving core you know jay played quite a bit of receiver last year even though it was more from a kind of a sniffer standpoint if you will more of a tight end full-back type he you know
028he'll this year he'll do that and play in the slot and then with mcconaughey out there and then uh you know i think the hicks kid will see quite a bit of time at one of the receivers just because he's a great target to throw to it six foot five and um and then saigon and colin sagan and drew megginson will split some time at our uh our z receiver and and um you know depending on how tired kid kids get you can see receivers they could be moving positions all day long so um but we know we've got some guys who can make plays and that's what it comes down to our line and just have to give our guys just enough time to get in the open field and try to go score
029touchdowns so i'm going to ask you this and you're probably going to tell me i can't give you that answer we're going to be a balanced attack you're just going to give me that simple answer sure yeah we're going to be 50 50. yeah exactly 100 yeah unless they line up with six or seven guys in the box and then we'll be 20 80. they line up with five guys in the box then we'll be 80 20. you know they predict what we do i don't predict that you know after five years i'm starting to understand what answers i don't even need to give you a coach's interview anymore i'll just be able to answer them for you that's right so i've done this for five years you said you've been doing it for 28
030this is your 21st season at columbia 146 and 60 overall 96 and 20 in the conference you're the longest tenured coach at columbia the most wins in school history eleven conference champs nine of them have been undefeated now you say just because nobody else would hire me well you say all that stuff but you got to go back to your assistant coaches coach maine's been there for 21 years with you it started with coach touche same way but now you got kendall stump baker uh amson coming in you got a pretty good crew that helps you out week in and week out and makes your job easier well well beings at practice started five minutes ago and i'm not there yeah i've got a good crew you could say the least and i don't feel
031at all concerned that i'm going to be a little tardy today um but no yeah i mean what can you say i 21 years as a head coach never thought i'd be doing it this long uh you know spent five years here as an assistant but uh there's there's two things uh i mean maybe i can i can say three things two or three things i think that that has led to all those those wins and and number one on the list is having players you got to have players i don't care you can put any kind of rinky dink monkey system together that you want if you got players they're going to go out and win games and that's what our kids have done all the way back from um you know the buzz
032and half dozen that we had back in 2001 we first started and uh all the way up through the great years of 07-08 state finals and through the your years in 11 and uh in 2012 we've had a couple you know weird years in there but we've had players and great players and guys that are dedicated your program come from great parents right and that's the other thing that we've had and then thirdly uh great coaching staff you know anytime you've got consistency in your staff when you've got consistency in your staff uh that's huge it's just it really is and scotty being with me for 21 years and the rest of the guys have been around for a really long time too it's you know our our kids it's just an easy transition from
033one level to the next right and that's you got to build it from the blue jay system all the way up to the jv system to the varsity and you're just the guy that gets all the praise but there's a lot of guys underneath of you too but you also get the headaches too i guess if you don't win but those gray hairs come in there a little bit too on those on the stressful days but all that being said week one muscuda haven't played them in two years now overall record two and two against muscuda i believe 07 was the first year you lost that was the year we went 8-1 in the regular season i can't think of when the other loss was but then we won probably three four years ago at
034their place 36 35 that was actually me and jared's first night we had everything under control we were doing good and then we didn't hit the record button so it was a great game that we called but there's no proof that we called it and then had the victory a couple years ago as well so now going in fifth matchup what are you expecting out of them this year i expect the same from them that the that we we got from them in 19 and you know even before that i guess in 18 it was uh they're going to have athletes all over the field like they always do their school 1100 students they're going to be quick they're going to be aggressive they've got a great program over there in all their sports they
035do have a new head coach this year which you know i i my guess is they'll just continue moving in the direction that they've been moving he's definitely a good football coach coming from the watseka program up there that's been successful so they're going gonna be good there's no question about it you know a handsome kid coming back at quarterbacks gonna be a load i mean this kid's legit he's really good um you know then then they've got a uh kendrick i think's the kid's name one of the receivers that's back um you know he's he's lightning fast he's gonna propose some problems for us but uh you know they're they're i guarantee you they're gunning for us because the last two games we played if you remember back the first time we beat them
036um here not too long ago was london little's 97-yard 94 yard kickoff return in the wailing minutes of the game and then a block uh field goal to seal it and then uh in a game that looked like it was the tide was turning in 2019 with a score i think was 21-7 and they've got the ball in the five-yard line and and little picks a pass off and runs it back 97 for a pick six they kind of put it out of reach so they're going to be ready i can promise you that they're going to be ready and like you said having a new coach it kind of you know i think we're going to watch this i think we're going to see that you're going to have to go on the fly
037and i expect you and coach mayne be able to go on the fly you guys have done it for this many years i think you'll be all right so uh we'll find out here in 24 hours in six minutes when week one officially kicks off underway and coach like you said now you're 10 minutes late don't speed to practice make sure you get there get the boys ready to go for tomorrow and uh we'll talk to you tomorrow and hopefully we get a eagles victory appreciate it alex thank you thank you all for listening this is the first week of the coaches corner presented by houlton meats we will be here every thursday 6 30. if anybody wants to come up we're going to be doing them all up at aces wild so come on
038up listen live and we'll be on youtube on kchs uh tomorrow night and every friday we'll be starting at 6 30 6 35 for the pre-game show presented by aces wild 7 p.m kickoff and we'll go from there so thanks again we'll see you all next week and have a good night [Music] you