What makes a great Texas High School Football Program?

[TexasPanther2012]

I’ve always been fascinated with the success of West Orange Stark , Newton , and in the early 2010’s under Barbay I was amazed at how good Coldspring was. So to me coaching is HUGE. Coldspring being my best case study. After Barbay they were not very good , they dropped in classification and instead of getting better they just became worse. The point of this post is to ask all of you old timers what YOU believe is the key to the success of teams like west orange stark. Is there something in the water ? Yes I believe they have better athletes than a school like Liberty. There’s no doubt about that year in and year out they have better athletes overall. When we played Coldspring in 2009 2010 2011 and they went to state to play Carthage they had better athletes, but recently Liberty crushed Coldspring a few years back , I saw some athletes out there but not as much as they had in 2010, and Barbay isn’t there anymore, so I know it’s not an exact science just curious to see everyone’s opinion on why a team like Newton and West Orange stay successful , but a team like Cleveland goes from a 2 to 3 round playoff team my freshman and sophomore year , to us beating them 36-6 my junior year in 2011 and they haven’t been good since then. They do still have athletes in Cleveland , a little bit different from the Coldspring situation. I’m rambling now but I wanted to clarify the question  

[AggiesAreWe]

Simple, gene pool. In a lot of the cases involving the small schools, no one leaves the area. Past great athletes never leaves the town. Raises his/her kids in their home town. Continuous cycle.

[Billontherig]

18 minutes ago, AggiesAreWe said:

Simple, gene pool. In a lot of the cases involving the small schools, no one leaves the area. Past great athletes never leaves the town. Raises his/her kids in their home town. Continuous cycle.

100% correct! Athletes breed athletes. Anybody can coach talented athletes. Its easy to coach Newton ...It would be impossible for Barbay to goto Itasca and take the Wampus Cats to the dance.

[TexasPanther2012]

24 minutes ago, AggiesAreWe said:

Simple, gene pool. In a lot of the cases involving the small schools, no one leaves the area. Past great athletes never leaves the town. Raises his/her kids in their home town. Continuous cycle.

I agree , but Cleveland has a lot of athletes and they’ll be good some years and bad other years but that team always has athletes , so it has to be a little on the program as well , Cleveland is a small town as well not as small as newton of course but it’s the same principle , most never leave . And they had years of success not wos or newton level success but my point is with the athletes they always have , its unbelievable they had that big of a drop off , and that was before they moved up in classification.

[Billontherig]

Look up Cleveland ISD current demographics and you will understand why they no longer reach the playoffs. They wont reach the playoffs again unless maybe they drop back down to 4A.

[Bulldogs92]

That same thing has always been true in Jasper, too. We don't always get the results we want and the relationship isn't always what it needs to be between the powers that be and the athletic department, but we've always had athletes. Getting everybody focused on one goal always helps and it looks like that's starting to change. 

[AggiesAreWe]

4 minutes ago, TexasPanther2012 said:

I agree , but Cleveland has a lot of athletes and they’ll be good some years and bad other years but that team always has athletes , so it has to be a little on the program as well , Cleveland is a small town as well not as small as newton of course but it’s the same principle , most never leave . And they had years of success not wos or newton level success but my point is with the athletes they always have , its unbelievable they had that big of a drop off , and that was before they moved up in classification.

Cleveland's move up to 5A was because of a great influx of baseball and soccer athletes, not football and basketball. If you get my drift. Comprende?

[Tiger33]

15 minutes ago, Billontherig said:

100% correct! Athletes breed athletes. Anybody can coach talented athletes. Its easy to coach Newton ...It would be impossible for Barbay to goto Itasca and take the Wampus Cats to the dance.

If this is true LCM will win a district championship and beat WOS in about 5 to 7 years with the 90’s gene pool coming along lol

[CardinalBacker]

Genetics related to a particular area has a lot to do with it, but not everything. All of the athleticism in the world won’t help without proper coaching and hard work in the years building up to the big stage. 

Kids from areas with a history of success have a lot more pressure on them to win and to prepare.  They are also the product of parents who know what it takes to win. Kids from Livingston aren’t expected to win by their community like kids from places like WOS or Newton. 

Strong little league programs, followed by good coaching/program through junior high, and serious physical development through high school are key. I’ve said over and over how our kids were competitive through little league based on coaching.  Our kids went to WOS for 7th grade (and won) but our coaching deficiency was obvious during warmups... WOS had kids drilling and ours were doing backbends and playing grab___ in the end zone. Our group literally learned nothing and developed nothing until Coach Dubois took over in 2015. That group lost an honest four years of progress because of woeful coaching. 

[Tim Riggins]

Livingston wasn’t always bad. Earlier this decade they were playoff contenders for several years.  Don’t know what happened up there, lack of athletes , poor coaching or some of both. 

[Guest ECBucFan]

Its pretty clear paying a coach a high salary doesn't  automatically buy yourself a "great program".

Athletes, transfers, tradition, numbers, coaching, community support, facilities. More or less in that order.

JMO.

 

[raideroldtimer]

It's consistency, you can't build a winning program if you keep changing coaches every 3 or 4 years. Case in point, Lumberton has most often gotten hammered in football which is coached by the head coach who seems to be ousted every 2 or 3 years. It's not because of lack of athletes, look at Lumbertons' soccer teams the boys have had 2 maybe 3 coaches in the last 20 years and they are always in the playoff hunt, the girls are even better. These are the assistant coaches that help in football and run one of the other programs and they tend to stay through different administrations. They actually build programs. Your West Orange, Nederland, and PNG type programs keep the coaches for a long time and in a couple of cases promote from within when the head coach retires. It's like nothing changes so the boys come in knowing what to do and the coaches know best how to play their opponents, instead of worrying if he'll keep his job this year.

[The Icon]

3 hours ago, AggiesAreWe said:

Simple, gene pool. In a lot of the cases involving the small schools, no one leaves the area. Past great athletes never leaves the town. Raises his/her kids in their home town. Continuous cycle.

+1000

[ATTITUDE IS EVERYTHING]

22 minutes ago, raideroldtimer said:

It's consistency, you can't build a winning program if you keep changing coaches every 3 or 4 years. Case in point, Lumberton has most often gotten hammered in football which is coached by the head coach who seems to be ousted every 2 or 3 years. It's not because of lack of athletes, look at Lumbertons' soccer teams the boys have had 2 maybe 3 coaches in the last 20 years and they are always in the playoff hunt, the girls are even better. These are the assistant coaches that help in football and run one of the other programs and they tend to stay through different administrations. They actually build programs. Your West Orange, Nederland, and PNG type programs keep the coaches for a long time and in a couple of cases promote from within when the head coach retires. It's like nothing changes so the boys come in knowing what to do and the coaches know best how to play their opponents, instead of worrying if he'll keep his job this year.

 Talented athletes don't  make great programs. Hard working discipline  coachable good  football players do. I give u 500 great athletes. Just give me 22 coachable hardworking good football players and I will beat u everytime. Tell 50 coaches what I just said and all 50 will agree with me. 

[GoFundMe]

Every year, it’s the same teams.

So, what do the same teams have?

They have the same blood as those that went before them. End of story.

I don’t wanna hear the Facilities argument.  WOS & NEWTON coaches dying for facilities and have done what they’ve done without it. Does it help? Sure. But it don’t hurt a select few programs in the State with superior athletes.

Outside of Brock, Celina, Argyle and a couple others...there is NO community in the state that has had football success without a good portion of superior black athletes. Don’t @ me.

[Guest ECBucFan]

5 hours ago, Billontherig said:

100% correct! Athletes breed athletes. Anybody can coach talented athletes. Its easy to coach Newton ...It would be impossible for Barbay to goto Itasca and take the Wampus Cats to the dance.

You are right. Justin Bieber could coach Newton to the State Championship this year, while Bill Belicheck could not coach several teams and win more than 1 or 2 games. 

[CardinalBacker]

2 hours ago, hornetsdad said:

Every year, it’s the same teams.

So, what do the same teams have?

They have the same blood as those that went before them. End of story.

I don’t wanna hear the Facilities argument.  WOS & NEWTON coaches dying for facilities and have done what they’ve done without it. Does it help? Sure. But it don’t hurt a select few programs in the State with superior athletes.

Outside of Brock, Celina, Argyle and a couple others...there is NO community in the state that has had football success without a good portion of superior black athletes. Don’t @ me

Jesus, racism sucks. 

I guess you also need a white qb and a white coach to win, too. If it all comes down to having black athletes, then why do so many majority black schools have losing programs? Inner city Houston schools should be collecting hardware every December. 

This has been covered a million times. 

[RedJollyRoger]

Come On Man....

Yeah, Newton is definitely unbelievable. But please don't discount the hours the coaching staff has, and does put in to prepare these kids week in and week out to set them up for success. (For many years) Talented athletes don't build and sustain programs.  

I agree that gene pool is important, also long tenured coaching that includes the youngsters, community support and a strong tradition of value placed on the  success of the athletic program. The "hot bed" areas of talent always draws the best coaches and the support of the community and the school keep them. IMO.  PURPLE REIGN!!!!!!

[jimmyw]

i would almost bet the bank that Newton's off season program is still Bigger, Faster and Stronger  and  i think they started using that program in the mid 80's. Gene pool is great but if you don't have the program that the kids will buy into and good coaching , you could have a week season. Also with a good gene pool, the program tends to make average athletes become good athletes and good athletes  become real good athletes and great athletes become maybe D1 athletes,. I would think are pee wee football team is somewhat based on the high school program .if kids do the same things repeatedly enough, it becomes instinct to them. JMHO

[Billontherig]

48 minutes ago, RedJollyRoger said:

Come On Man....

Yeah, Newton is definitely unbelievable. But please don't discount the hours the coaching staff has, and does put in to prepare these kids week in and week out to set them up for success. (For many years) Talented athletes don't build and sustain programs.  

I agree that gene pool is important, also long tenured coaching that includes the youngsters, community support and a strong tradition of value placed on the  success of the athletic program. The "hot bed" areas of talent always draws the best coaches and the support of the community and the school keep them. IMO.  PURPLE REIGN!!!!!!

6 hours ago, ATTITUDE IS EVERYTHING said:

 Talented athletes don't  make great programs. Hard working discipline  coachable good  football players do. I give u 500 great athletes. Just give me 22 coachable hardworking good football players and I will beat u everytime. Tell 50 coaches what I just said and all 50 will agree with me. 

With all you knowledgeable football guys on here...and all the great opinions i’m sure Westerberg and BH will be in the Title game before you know it. I am willing to bet the boys at BH work their tails off but are simply not as talented as most playoff contending programs. You cant use the community support argument BH has an indoor practice field and one of the highest paid coaches in the state.

As far as the race issue on here just look at active D-1 and NFL team rosters. You would be more likely to get struck by lightning and hit by a truck on the same day  than see a white defensive back in the NFL. 

[RedJollyRoger]

Please don't mistake all the resources that BH has their ability to pay the highest salary in the state as a good, quality program with the best coaching. No doubt those kids work their tails off...my intent is not to aim this at the kids. But it takes much more than money to build a successful program.

[Uncle Pig]

In the larger classifications, it’s all about $. There’s a lot to be said about a good athlete that is raised in a household with both parents who make a combined 200K a year. The kid lives in a nice house, gets 3 incredible meals a day, sleeps in a nice bed, works with personal trainers, etc. Just look at the state champs at 5A-6A level past decade: Allen, Lake Travis, Katy, Aledo...all very affluent areas. The day of the title 1 school being relevant in larger classifications is history. Just my 2 cents. 

[Guest ECBucFan]

17 minutes ago, Uncle Pig said:

In the larger classifications, it’s all about $. There’s a lot to be said about a good athlete that is raised in a household with both parents who make a combined 200K a year. The kid lives in a nice house, gets 3 incredible meals a day, sleeps in a nice bed, works with personal trainers, etc. Just look at the state champs at 5A-6A level past decade: Allen, Lake Travis, Katy, Aledo...all very affluent areas. The day of the title 1 school being relevant in larger classifications is history. Just my 2 cents. 

Allen and Katy are mega schools.

Allen and Katy get lots of top transfers out of greater D-FW and Houston, respectively.

 

[D3zii]

12 hours ago, CardinalBacker said:

Genetics related to a particular area has a lot to do with it, but not everything. All of the athleticism in the world won’t help without proper coaching and hard work in the years building up to the big stage. 

Kids from areas with a history of success have a lot more pressure on them to win and to prepare.  They are also the product of parents who know what it takes to win. Kids from Livingston aren’t expected to win by their community like kids from places like WOS or Newton. 

Strong little league programs, followed by good coaching/program through junior high, and serious physical development through high school are key. I’ve said over and over how our kids were competitive through little league based on coaching.  Our kids went to WOS for 7th grade (and won) but our coaching deficiency was obvious during warmups... WOS had kids drilling and ours were doing backbends and playing grab___ in the end zone. Our group literally learned nothing and developed nothing until Coach Dubois took over in 2015. That group lost an honest four years of progress because of woeful coaching. 

This is definetly true...Just cause you have athletes doesn’t guarantee you a win. you have to establish a system , Like Your W.O.S where when you come in you buy into the system which means (Pratice habits, Coaching, Swagger, Workouts,etc) cause you know that’s what you do at W.O.S “Win” You have to have a buy in from the kids as well as coaches, 

[TexasPanther2012]

4 hours ago, RedJollyRoger said:

Come On Man....

Yeah, Newton is definitely unbelievable. But please don't discount the hours the coaching staff has, and does put in to prepare these kids week in and week out to set them up for success. (For many years) Talented athletes don't build and sustain programs.  

I agree that gene pool is important, also long tenured coaching that includes the youngsters, community support and a strong tradition of value placed on the  success of the athletic program. The "hot bed" areas of talent always draws the best coaches and the support of the community and the school keep them. IMO.  PURPLE REIGN!!!!!!

I like this response. Dead on.