Latest / Let's Talk with Carl Lee / Coach Pat Kirkland, Dr. Jaclyn Swayne on Let's Talk with Carl Lee, with Lisa Otey and Hollis Lewis

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Coach Pat Kirkland, Dr. Jaclyn Swayne on Let's Talk with Carl Lee, with Lisa Otey and Hollis Lewis · Let's Talk with Carl Lee

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you gotta work. You gotta work, Ruy Shine, it's
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Speaker 1: mine gotta show. Everybody is my sign you gotta work,
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Speaker 1: right Shine. Another mind trying to die today line don't tell.
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Speaker 2: You gotta work.
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Speaker 3: Welcome to Let's Talk with Carl Lee and frequent guest
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Speaker 3: hosts Hollis Lewis and Lisa Odie, where sports culture and
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Speaker 3: community intersect. Join the crew as they dive into engaging
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Speaker 3: conversations with guests from all walks of the sports life.
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Speaker 3: Let's Talk as proudly presented by Attorney Frank Walker, Real Talk,
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Speaker 3: Real Experience, Real Results, Frank Walker Law dot com and
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Speaker 3: by the all new historic Choyer Diner in downtown Charleston,
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Speaker 3: one line at Choyerdner dot com. Let the conversation begin
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Speaker 3: on Let's Talk.
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Speaker 2: All right, ladies and gentlemen.
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Speaker 4: This is Carl Lee with Let's Talk, and we have
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Speaker 4: a I have my co host Hollis Lewis, Hello, Hello,
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Speaker 4: and my other co host Lisa Odi.
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Speaker 5: Hello.
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Speaker 2: And Lisa Odi.
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Speaker 4: Has brought us a guest knowing and she's going to
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Speaker 4: introduce and we will Q and a M.
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Speaker 2: Yes.
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Speaker 5: So we're excited about this guest tonight. Now that we're
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Speaker 5: only what four or five sleeps away from college football
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Speaker 5: kicking off. I like it right right, so our guest tonight.
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Speaker 5: He has quite an extensive resume. I'm going to give
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Speaker 5: you a little bit of background before I introduce him,
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Speaker 5: But he this year is the first year special teams
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Speaker 5: coordinator and defensive assistant coach to Rich Rod in Morgantown.
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Speaker 5: Just last year and in twenty twenty four, he was
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Speaker 5: the coordinator at Jacksonville State. I'm going to give you
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Speaker 5: some information about that that will kind of blow your mind.
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Speaker 5: But his special teams ranked number two in Conference USA
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Speaker 5: kickoff returns, kick return defense, net punting punt returns, and
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Speaker 5: punt return defense. Twenty twenty three, the game Cocks averaged
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Speaker 5: six Listen to this, sixty two point one yards per
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Speaker 5: kickoff with thirty nine touchbacks. Nice jack jack State's defense
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Speaker 5: led Conference USA and sacks I believe the same year
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Speaker 5: twenty twenty three, pack can I said his name, He
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Speaker 5: can correct me if I'm wrong. They racked up thirty
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Speaker 5: nine sacks in thirteen games, resulting in two hundred and
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Speaker 5: ninety one lost yards. His resume also includes ten years
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Speaker 5: of head coaching experience at the University of Charleston, where
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Speaker 5: in twenty fifteen his football team finished ten and one,
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Speaker 5: ranked number fifteen in the nation after earning a spot
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Speaker 5: in the NCAA Division Two playoffs. He's a native of Akron, Ohio,
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Speaker 5: and earned degrees from Muskingen University and played collegiate ball there.
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Speaker 5: So welcome our special guest tonight, Coach pack Kirkland.
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Speaker 2: Hey, Coachland, Good, how are you, coach?
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Speaker 6: I'm doing great to hear from you, guys. How's everything going.
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Speaker 2: Oh, it's moving, We're keeping it moving.
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Speaker 4: I want to My first question is, Okay, So when
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Speaker 4: I'm hearing all of this that that least is talking
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Speaker 4: about of your achievements, I go right straight to the
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Speaker 4: special teams thing, because one most folks don't understand the
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Speaker 4: relevance and how important special teams are.
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Speaker 2: And I'm trying to figure out, like I'm.
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Speaker 4: Listening to all these acculades that you have there, and
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Speaker 4: I'm trying to figure out, like, how do you what
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Speaker 4: is what is it that you're looking for when you
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Speaker 4: start looking for a guy who's going to run down
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Speaker 4: on kickoffs or any of that kind of stuff, Because
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Speaker 4: how do you what are you trying to do?
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Speaker 2: What do you who are you, How are.
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Speaker 4: You trying to put this group together that they can
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Speaker 4: do this and achieve these kinds of honors.
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Speaker 6: Yeah, well, I think the first of ball is getting
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Speaker 6: those guys buying in on how big of the role
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Speaker 6: special teams plays in a game. So you know, when
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Speaker 6: you know, we looked at all of West Virginia University's
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Speaker 6: games last year and broke them down and you know,
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Speaker 6: counted the number of snaps and we found out really
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Speaker 6: special teams with anywhere nineteen to twenty two percent of
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Speaker 6: snaps or some form of a special team to play.
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Speaker 6: And when you start talking to two young people and
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Speaker 6: guys on the team about that and the role that
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Speaker 6: that plays, they understand the importance of it. And and
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Speaker 6: you know, then you start bringing up game tape and
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Speaker 6: seeing the difference and the opportunities that they had maybe
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Speaker 6: even last year to you know, do some things and
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Speaker 6: and and change the course of the game. And you know,
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Speaker 6: obviously now guys also want to create some value for themselves.
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Speaker 6: And you know, Carl, you know, playing at the next level,
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Speaker 6: if you're not out the quarterback or you know, an
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Speaker 6: offense or defensive lineman or that that first round draft,
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Speaker 6: you're on a special teams, right, and so they know
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Speaker 6: it's also the opportunity to create some value for themselves.
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Speaker 6: So you know, we're I'm blessed to work for a
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Speaker 6: head coach that that you know, we spend a lot
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Speaker 6: of time on it, and you know, we want to
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Speaker 6: make sure we put the guys that fit the role
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Speaker 6: that we're asking to play. From the from the special
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Speaker 6: team standpoint, there used.
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Speaker 4: To be a kind of a stereotype of the type
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Speaker 4: of player who plays special teams. And I and I
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Speaker 4: was a I was a gunner on the punt team.
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Speaker 4: I was an R three on the kickoff team my
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Speaker 4: entire career in Minnesota. So I and I hated it.
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Speaker 4: But but but it was something that you know, you
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Speaker 4: couldn't you know, I couldn't say, well, I don't want
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Speaker 4: to I don't want to do this, you know, And
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Speaker 4: then you can't say, well, I'm not gonna do it
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Speaker 4: hard because because you're gonna get knocked out. And I
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Speaker 4: had those experiences of running down and trying to figure
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Speaker 4: out who's blocking me, and I got I got blindsided
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Speaker 4: a few times, and I was like, okay, so I
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Speaker 4: I understand too. The film work of trying to figure
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Speaker 4: out who's that guy that's going to be coming to
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Speaker 4: hit you?
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Speaker 6: You know, so.
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Speaker 4: You you you How do you hype the kids to
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Speaker 4: get them to say, like, okay, and I get it,
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Speaker 4: they're not playing off to not playing defense general special teams.
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Speaker 4: What is it that motivate What is it that you
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Speaker 4: use to kind of really truly motivate them to want
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Speaker 4: to be the best of anybody else's kickoff team or
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Speaker 4: kickoff return team or punt cover team. What what is
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Speaker 4: it that you use to get them How do you
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Speaker 4: sell them on that, because I think I think that's
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Speaker 4: a that's an amazing feat if you're able to do that.
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Speaker 6: Yeah, and I'm with you. It definitely takes a you know,
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Speaker 6: a special person with mentality and the accountability to to
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Speaker 6: you know, we call them teamers here, guys that play
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Speaker 6: a big role on special teams and maybe not as
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Speaker 6: big of a role on offense or defense, but it's
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Speaker 6: guys that are bought into one. They love to compete,
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Speaker 6: and there's probably a mentality that is a little bit
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Speaker 6: different because like you said, I'm still you can scheme
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Speaker 6: up kickoff all you want it. Definitely, the personnel you've
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Speaker 6: got on that unit, and I am all in on
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Speaker 6: that finding the right guys that you know, like you
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Speaker 6: are fearless and want to come pete and play at
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Speaker 6: a high level and aren't afraid of contact. You know,
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Speaker 6: that's for sure, and and you know that's that takes
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Speaker 6: some time. That's probably one of our biggest challenges when
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Speaker 6: we came in in January and then got in the
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Speaker 6: spring ball was just you know, trying to evaluate talent,
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Speaker 6: not just you know, at position specific stuff on offense
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Speaker 6: or defense, but guys that fit the mentality and we
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Speaker 6: could plug and play in some of those roles on
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Speaker 6: special teams. But you know, I draw from a lot
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Speaker 6: of guys that have amazing NFL careers because of their
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Speaker 6: roles they play on special teams. And I said, hey,
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Speaker 6: we're all not going to be first round, second round
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Speaker 6: draft picks. But you know these are roles now that
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Speaker 6: that you know NFL, you know scouts and coaches are
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Speaker 6: looking for and this is what they want to see.
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Speaker 6: And not just that, but if you got the right guys,
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Speaker 6: they just want to go out there and compete. At
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Speaker 6: the end of the day, we're all working hard and
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Speaker 6: you want to get on the field, and you know,
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Speaker 6: you want those guys that, regardless of what it is,
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Speaker 6: any opportunity to see playing time, they're going to take
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Speaker 6: advantage of it.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, So coach, I wanted to just kind of touch on.
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Speaker 5: I saw that you had an interview with MSN about
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Speaker 5: a week ago and you mentioned wanting competition at all
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Speaker 5: of your specialist positions. Have you finally settled on your
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Speaker 5: starting punter and field goal kicker for the season or
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Speaker 5: is it still something you're working through.
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Speaker 6: We're closer, you know, right now. We got a returning
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Speaker 6: starter in Ali Straw who's from Melbourne, Australia. He was
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Speaker 6: a starter last year. He's doing some different things for
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Speaker 6: us this here as far as what they asked from
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Speaker 6: a year ago. He's someone that's got a very unique
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Speaker 6: skill set. He can do all the different unique style
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Speaker 6: kicks and punts that that teams are doing now. So
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Speaker 6: he's definitely as merged as a leader in that specialist room,
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Speaker 6: and you know, he's kind of taken over that, you know,
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Speaker 6: definitely the role as that starting punter. And we got
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Speaker 6: some other guys that are very capable, but you know,
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Speaker 6: Ali's a senior and he's a proven compet editor and
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Speaker 6: leader and done a great job. The other ones we're
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Speaker 6: still we're still working on. You know, I think we're
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Speaker 6: going to head right up into it with it. We
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Speaker 6: had a couple of guys that are very capable, and
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Speaker 6: you know, thank goodness, we still got a couple more
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Speaker 6: days to evaluate. And that's not because I don't think
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Speaker 6: any of them are worthy of It's just we're blessed
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Speaker 6: to have a couple of guys that we feel good about.
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Speaker 7: Coaches is Hollis Now, I just want to get into
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Speaker 7: like the mindset of a special teams coordinator, because I
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Speaker 7: think the novice fan may not understand sort of the
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Speaker 7: duplicity that happens because you have to not only approach
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Speaker 7: it from a defensive standpoint, you need to approach it
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Speaker 7: from an offensive standpoint. And at the same time you
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Speaker 7: want to sort of, you know, squash mistakes, which is
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Speaker 7: glaring from the special team. So just managing those different
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Speaker 7: perspectives and the various teams, because.
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Speaker 2: It's not just you're not just coaching office.
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Speaker 7: You have to punt return, the punt team, the kickoff team,
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Speaker 7: you know, the field goals, so everything that you do count.
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Speaker 2: So how do you how do you manage.
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Speaker 6: All that well, we've we've got a lot of good
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Speaker 6: guys that that I work with here on special teams
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Speaker 6: and that are a big, big help with that. You know,
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Speaker 6: some of the stuff that people you know, they always
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Speaker 6: talk about the kicker, the punt returner, the kick returner,
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Speaker 6: you know, that's a piece of it. But finding the
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Speaker 6: guys that can block, protect, run down, cover kicks, do
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Speaker 6: all those things as a really big part of it,
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Speaker 6: because especially you know, you go into Big twelve play,
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Speaker 6: we're going to see some pretty dynamic you know, returners
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Speaker 6: on kickoff and punt return and equally, you know they're
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Speaker 6: going to have guys everybody's putting their best athletes now
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Speaker 6: to try to come after kicks and block kicks. So,
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Speaker 6: you know, our goal one is is to be diverse
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Speaker 6: enough in the kicking game that we're not predictable. And
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Speaker 6: you've got to be careful, especially early on in the season.
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Speaker 6: You don't want to have so much in that the
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Speaker 6: kids can't execute at a high level. And that's important.
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Speaker 6: But you know, really what we're we'll do early well,
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Speaker 6: we'll try to keep it somewhat simple, you know, early
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Speaker 6: and and keep building on that as the season goes on.
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Speaker 6: You know a lot of that's just doing a great
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Speaker 6: job of self scouting. You know what did you do
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Speaker 6: last week that teams may pick up on? And you
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Speaker 6: know what can we what rakles can we throw in
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Speaker 6: week to week to help us out nice.
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Speaker 4: One of the other things that that I think about
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Speaker 4: when I when I think about special teams is the
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Speaker 4: the excitement that comes with let's say the kickoff, the
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Speaker 4: initial kickoff and the players who are those kind of
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Speaker 4: guys that are are your I guess you can almost
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Speaker 4: call them hype guys that you just can automatically count
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Speaker 4: on those kind of guys. Do you do you purposely
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Speaker 4: press them to do that or I know that they'll
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Speaker 4: do it on their own. But is there a place
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Speaker 4: where you want that you want to get in front
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Speaker 4: of that guy, talk to him and say, come on,
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Speaker 4: we gotta go.
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Speaker 6: We got it?
12:06
Speaker 4: You know you you want to get him going so
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Speaker 4: that you know he's going to go crazy. Do you
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Speaker 4: have those types of guys that you that you kind
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Speaker 4: of push to get crazy and they'll do it for you?
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Speaker 6: Like Carl, Absolutely No, he's spot on. You can tell
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Speaker 6: this guy that that that gets it, because those are
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Speaker 6: the guys you're looking for and you hope on your team.
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Speaker 6: You don't have to look too hard to find these guys,
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Speaker 6: you know, because one that they are a big personality
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Speaker 6: in your program. They have a passion for football and
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Speaker 6: you don't have to give them a pep talk to
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Speaker 6: get them ready to go. But you love doing it
12:47
Speaker 6: because they get you fired up as well. And we've
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Speaker 6: got some guys that you know are ready for Saturday
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Speaker 6: and just to go down there and get after it.
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Speaker 6: You know, I'm hoping that you know, we got kickoff
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Speaker 6: off first, and we go down there and set the
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Speaker 6: tempo and and you know, get the crowd involved early
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Speaker 6: because you know, those guys they've they've worked hard, and
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Speaker 6: I think we've got a good unit, some guys that uh,
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Speaker 6: you know, really care about w football and and and
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Speaker 6: have a passion for it. But it does take a
13:16
Speaker 6: different mentality. It's not for everyone, right, you know, we
13:18
Speaker 6: got some really good football players on this team, and
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Speaker 6: I'm not saying names, but they wouldn't be good on
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Speaker 6: kickoff coverage. That's just not what their forte is. You know,
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Speaker 6: it takes a special kind of mentality and and and
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Speaker 6: and personality go down there and get that job done.
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Speaker 4: And and one of the things that I can, and
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Speaker 4: I'm not going to eat up all the conversation, but
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Speaker 4: sure one of the one of the things that I can.
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Speaker 4: When I hear you say that, I'm I'm looking at
13:44
Speaker 4: some players that I had played with who in my
13:47
Speaker 4: mind to what you said, there's great, great, great football players,
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Speaker 4: you know, but never are they going to be able
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Speaker 4: to run down on the kickoff, like you know what
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Speaker 4: I'm saying, Like there's just no way they could make
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Speaker 4: the kickoff team. And that sounds crazy when you think
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Speaker 4: some of your best players cannot make the kickoff team
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Speaker 4: the punt return team.
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Speaker 2: They just can't.
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Speaker 4: Because for whatever the reason is that guy or those
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Speaker 4: guys who are not playing and they accept that role
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Speaker 4: like it it's their thing.
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Speaker 2: They don't even there's no chance you can move them
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Speaker 2: out of there, no question. Yeah.
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Speaker 6: And I tell those guys going down on kickoff listen, man,
14:31
Speaker 6: you know we break this thing down to, you know,
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Speaker 6: the takeoff, the speed and red zone, the devoid zone,
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Speaker 6: the contact and finish own. I said, if you get
14:40
Speaker 6: through that speed and red zone and you're not blocked,
14:43
Speaker 6: get your head on the swivel. That's coming.
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Speaker 2: I wish it. It told me that early.
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Speaker 6: It's coming, so you better, you better find it because
14:53
Speaker 6: you know they don't make mistakes, you know, and and
14:56
Speaker 6: they're just not making it easy on you. But you know,
14:58
Speaker 6: you're you're spot on, you know, finding those guys that
15:01
Speaker 6: just love the game and play with a passion and
15:04
Speaker 6: are selfless and very team oriented. Those are the types
15:08
Speaker 6: of guys you know that I think we got on
15:10
Speaker 6: those units. And I'm really fortunate to have a lot
15:13
Speaker 6: of those guys that are excited for Saturday to get here.
15:16
Speaker 4: And it's bad that they don't get that. They don't
15:19
Speaker 4: get the credit going forward because they do because it
15:23
Speaker 4: is a big role. It's a huge role. It's huge.
15:27
Speaker 4: It's huge in the game. And yet you know, unless
15:31
Speaker 4: you're a returner or a kicker who's got some touchdowns,
15:35
Speaker 4: kick some game winning shrevelle goals, put it in the
15:37
Speaker 4: corner as if you're a punter, you're getting all that attention.
15:40
Speaker 4: But man, there's some of those guys that are running
15:43
Speaker 4: down that are that are putting their life on the line, basically.
15:48
Speaker 6: Our long snapper and short snapper. I said, listen, man,
15:50
Speaker 6: I'm just canna be very upfront and honest with you
15:52
Speaker 6: right now. Usually if they know your name, it's not
15:55
Speaker 6: a good thing. You know, you have a bad stack.
16:00
Speaker 6: He'll recognize you for the good one, bad one to
16:03
Speaker 6: come out.
16:04
Speaker 5: Yeah, if you're anonymous, that that's a good thing in
16:07
Speaker 5: this in that department.
16:08
Speaker 6: Yes, yeah, absolutely absolutely so.
16:11
Speaker 5: Coach I'm going to ask you a little bit about
16:13
Speaker 5: your relationship with rich Rod. This is your your third
16:16
Speaker 5: time with him. You you originally began coaching with him
16:19
Speaker 5: in two thousand and seven at WU I Believe, and
16:21
Speaker 5: then you you followed him to Jacksonville State. Uh, and
16:25
Speaker 5: now you're back back home in Morgantown. What has consistently
16:28
Speaker 5: drawn you back to Coach Rod and his style of play?
16:32
Speaker 6: You know what I got here the first time is
16:34
Speaker 6: just his style of coaching. I was really impressed with.
16:39
Speaker 6: You know, he just he has such a passion for
16:42
Speaker 6: the game, loves to compete, and he doesn't flinch everybody.
16:46
Speaker 6: You know, he treats all the players the same, and
16:48
Speaker 6: he coaches with a passion and is aggressive with it
16:52
Speaker 6: and and wants the best for these young men, but
16:54
Speaker 6: also wants them to understand how to compete at a
16:57
Speaker 6: high level. And you know, I thought it was going
17:01
Speaker 6: to be easy to do. And then I got my
17:02
Speaker 6: first head coaching opportunity, and you know, I learned this.
17:07
Speaker 6: You know, coaching is kind of like teaching and stuff.
17:09
Speaker 6: It's it's more of an extension of your personality.
17:12
Speaker 8: You know.
17:13
Speaker 6: I didn't say I really wanted to, you know, I
17:15
Speaker 6: was trying to be like him, but there was a
17:16
Speaker 6: lot of things that you know, I was always impressed
17:19
Speaker 6: on just how how hard the players played for him
17:23
Speaker 6: and their willingness to go out there and compete at
17:26
Speaker 6: a high level and not flinch, and that's not easy
17:30
Speaker 6: to do. And I was just I knew when he
17:33
Speaker 6: got the job at Jacksonville it's something that I wanted
17:35
Speaker 6: to be a part of and kind of get back,
17:39
Speaker 6: you know, when that coaching family with him again. And
17:42
Speaker 6: then obviously was blessed we had some success down there,
17:45
Speaker 6: and you know, we were able to come back up
17:46
Speaker 6: here to Morgantown.
17:48
Speaker 7: Now, now, prior to you know, going to Jacksonville, you
17:52
Speaker 7: were actually the head coach here at the University of
17:54
Speaker 7: Charleston and Charleston where we're based out. You know, I'm
17:57
Speaker 7: a state guy, so I won't hold that.
17:59
Speaker 6: Against you, but I'm not gonna tell you my record.
18:04
Speaker 7: I don't even want to hear that, nor do I,
18:08
Speaker 7: but you you've had you had tremendous success there as
18:12
Speaker 7: far as you know, not only winning on the field.
18:15
Speaker 7: You got I believe, forty plus guys in the NFL camp.
18:18
Speaker 7: You had a couple of guys drafted, You had some
18:21
Speaker 7: national rankings. You know, being at a Division two program
18:25
Speaker 7: where you don't always have the resources and you certainly
18:28
Speaker 7: always don't have the notoriety on you, what was sort
18:31
Speaker 7: of the key to building.
18:33
Speaker 2: That program up?
18:35
Speaker 6: Well, one I had There's I worked with some really
18:38
Speaker 6: good people and not just assistant coaches, but administrators and
18:42
Speaker 6: you know Brent Stevens, doctor Stevens, the athletic director. There
18:45
Speaker 6: is a phenomenal person to work for, and and and
18:48
Speaker 6: and you know, both the presidents that I was there
18:51
Speaker 6: with were great. They were committed to winning. And you know,
18:56
Speaker 6: the thing about Charleston is it's it's an attractive place.
19:00
Speaker 6: You know, the school one is, has got a great
19:01
Speaker 6: academic reputation, but when you look at some of the
19:05
Speaker 6: other schools maybe that you're competing with and recruiting, I mean,
19:08
Speaker 6: you're in the state capitol. I mean you can have
19:12
Speaker 6: some life and balance outside of football and school in
19:14
Speaker 6: the city at Charleston, which you know was always attractive,
19:18
Speaker 6: you know to young people that are going there. So
19:22
Speaker 6: now now it's a little bit different time with the
19:25
Speaker 6: poor I'm not sure I would have kept some of
19:27
Speaker 6: those guys. Yeah, you know, success, but yeah, and you know,
19:31
Speaker 6: I think some of the assistant coaches did a great
19:33
Speaker 6: job of just evaluating some some guys out of high
19:36
Speaker 6: school that maybe had the size and speed, but maybe
19:39
Speaker 6: just weren't developed enough to get some of the bigger looks.
19:42
Speaker 6: And you know, a lot of those guys that that
19:45
Speaker 6: got drafted in the NFL or made its NFL camps,
19:48
Speaker 6: a lot of them read shirt at Charleston, you know,
19:50
Speaker 6: which you don't see anymore. But like I said, I
19:53
Speaker 6: what a great experience I had there and the people
19:55
Speaker 6: were tremendous.
19:56
Speaker 7: Yeah, and don't tell my state family, but I'm actually
19:59
Speaker 7: an adjunct you see this year a little bit so yes,
20:05
Speaker 7: And in less than a week you got guys got
20:07
Speaker 7: your Mountaineers WV. And we're talking to Special Teams coordinator
20:11
Speaker 7: WV you Pat Kirkley. We have you know, August thirty.
20:14
Speaker 7: If you have your first game, Roberts Moore, So what
20:18
Speaker 7: what are you looking for? What are what what are
20:20
Speaker 7: the things you're looking for from uh far as in
20:23
Speaker 7: that game? And what do you hope to accomplish?
20:26
Speaker 6: Yeah, you know, any any week one game and whatever
20:29
Speaker 6: level you're at, you know, especially you know now with
20:32
Speaker 6: with a number of new players that are going to
20:34
Speaker 6: be playing here at w and you know, making the transition.
20:38
Speaker 6: It's a it's a new scheme. In all three phases.
20:41
Speaker 6: You want to go out and see see players execute
20:44
Speaker 6: one at a high level. You know, try to eliminate
20:46
Speaker 6: the mistakes, you know, the mental mistakes, but just watch them,
20:51
Speaker 6: have them play fast and then really just compete and
20:56
Speaker 6: and and you know, maybe the game plan doesn't need
20:59
Speaker 6: to be huge. It just needs to be to the
21:01
Speaker 6: point where those guys can go out there and you
21:04
Speaker 6: never want to say, you know, not not not think
21:07
Speaker 6: a whole lot, but because you got to that's football.
21:10
Speaker 6: You've got to, you know, your heart in your head
21:12
Speaker 6: got to meet halfway there.
21:13
Speaker 5: You can't just be all.
21:14
Speaker 6: Passion and no thought process. But just want to see
21:17
Speaker 6: him go out there and play fast and if you
21:19
Speaker 6: make a mistake, make it fast, and you know, live
21:21
Speaker 6: you know, go play the next step.
21:23
Speaker 5: Yeah, so, coach, I have a question about your positions.
21:28
Speaker 5: You're actually serving not just the position of special teams coordinator,
21:32
Speaker 5: but it also lists you as a defensive assistant coach.
21:35
Speaker 5: How difficult is that juggling those two positions at a
21:38
Speaker 5: major school like WVU.
21:41
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean it's I'm a defensive guy at Hart.
21:44
Speaker 2: You know, I was.
21:45
Speaker 6: I've been a coordinator for for a long time, and
21:48
Speaker 6: you know, I'm not sure I was really good at it.
21:50
Speaker 6: But you know, even as a player, I was a
21:52
Speaker 6: corner and you know, that's kind of where my passion started.
21:56
Speaker 6: So to still play a role on the defensive side,
21:59
Speaker 6: especially now you know there's so many sub packages, not
22:03
Speaker 6: just Nickolindine, but you know, some other stuff. So you know,
22:07
Speaker 6: I've got a roll with that, which is exciting, but
22:10
Speaker 6: it is a lot, you know, when you get into
22:13
Speaker 6: some of these game weeks where you know, Monday, Tuesday,
22:16
Speaker 6: Wednesday nights, they they become kind of early mornings for
22:19
Speaker 6: the most part. And really fortunate that some of the
22:23
Speaker 6: coaches here I work with with Special teams, Chris Herring
22:26
Speaker 6: and Tucker Donatti are phenomenal, phenomenal, So we've got a
22:30
Speaker 6: really good support staff and coaching staff, and but but
22:34
Speaker 6: it's it's not easy a lot of it, especially when
22:36
Speaker 6: you get later in the year and you're breaking down
22:39
Speaker 6: a lot more games, a lot more plays that go
22:42
Speaker 6: through it. It's a little more challenging.
22:44
Speaker 4: And an interesting thing that I guess I don't really
22:49
Speaker 4: know how this and I should, but I don't know
22:51
Speaker 4: how this necessarily works as a as a as a
22:55
Speaker 4: dB coach, are you are you basically stuck on how
23:00
Speaker 4: you're going to do your secondary based off of what
23:05
Speaker 4: the decordinator is gonna tell you?
23:07
Speaker 2: Or can you know?
23:08
Speaker 4: Because I know when when in Minnesota when Floyd Peters
23:12
Speaker 4: came in and Pete Carroll came in. They came in
23:16
Speaker 4: and it was we're gonna blitz, We're gonna play man
23:18
Speaker 4: the Man, and boom, that's it.
23:20
Speaker 2: You know, whether or not Pete.
23:22
Speaker 4: Had he I don't know if he had any control
23:24
Speaker 4: in that or if they had conversation.
23:26
Speaker 2: But is there conversation.
23:29
Speaker 4: Of like how you want to play in the secondary,
23:31
Speaker 4: how the backers are going to play, how the D
23:32
Speaker 4: line's gonna play, Tell the folks how that really kind
23:36
Speaker 4: of comes together.
23:37
Speaker 2: How do you develop that defense? Because it's it is
23:40
Speaker 2: three different kind of parts of it.
23:42
Speaker 6: Absolutely. And I you know Zach Ally, you know who
23:46
Speaker 6: I'd worked with for two years at Jacksonville State before
23:49
Speaker 6: he went was the defensive coordinator at Oklahoma for a year.
23:52
Speaker 6: You know, now we're back together here, you know at
23:54
Speaker 6: West Virginia. He's he's got some ideas. But I think
23:59
Speaker 6: the one thing that's great about him as he listens
24:01
Speaker 6: and he understands we've all been doing this for quite
24:03
Speaker 6: some time, and you know, he asked for the input. Now,
24:07
Speaker 6: like you know this, there's certain defenses and calls that
24:10
Speaker 6: you run that call for specific techniques, right. But at
24:14
Speaker 6: the same time, the one thing you know, I'm really
24:17
Speaker 6: passionate about on defenses, you don't want those players, especially
24:20
Speaker 6: at corner, to be robots, you know, being a corner
24:24
Speaker 6: and you're and whether you're playing pressman, off man or
24:27
Speaker 6: zone coverage, you know, you know what you did the
24:30
Speaker 6: prior to plays or three plays ago to set it
24:32
Speaker 6: up when when you played pressman and you don't want
24:36
Speaker 6: want to be handcuffed because of a call and say
24:38
Speaker 6: I've got to do this specific technique, you know, because
24:41
Speaker 6: that might not be your skill set or it might
24:43
Speaker 6: not work against that, you know your opponent. You know,
24:46
Speaker 6: it's like when you're a pass rusher. You don't want
24:48
Speaker 6: someone to say, hey, every time you got to go
24:49
Speaker 6: speed to power or you got to do a ghost rusher,
24:52
Speaker 6: you know, club rip. You know, everybody's got a little
24:55
Speaker 6: bit of different tools in their toolbox. So you want
24:58
Speaker 6: the players to play fast and do what works for them.
25:00
Speaker 6: But at the same time, you know, a squad corner
25:03
Speaker 6: is a squad corner. He playing cover two, you know
25:05
Speaker 6: what I mean. There's only so many things you can
25:06
Speaker 6: do pre snap to disguise that. So, you know, I
25:09
Speaker 6: think it's a little bit of just meeting halfway and
25:12
Speaker 6: and he's he's tremendous at at you know, really suggesting
25:17
Speaker 6: and saying, hey, we've got to do this in this situation.
25:19
Speaker 6: But other than that, you know, couple the technique with
25:22
Speaker 6: the down and distance and and you hope you educate
25:25
Speaker 6: the players enough that they can do that on their own.
25:28
Speaker 2: All right, well, we're gonna let you go. I'll just
25:30
Speaker 2: say this to the to the listeners.
25:33
Speaker 4: I hope that you can understand the complication, how complicated
25:38
Speaker 4: all of this is. And and and I'm sure that
25:41
Speaker 4: there's a whole lot of people who are listening and
25:43
Speaker 4: have no idea what we said or what we talked about.
25:47
Speaker 4: But that is the complication. That that is what football is.
25:50
Speaker 4: It is at each level. It is just different. It's
25:53
Speaker 4: just complicated. It can be difficult.
25:55
Speaker 5: And to serve two roles at a major university, that
25:58
Speaker 5: that's that's a lot.
26:00
Speaker 7: Good luck, coach, Yes, best wishes to the Mountaineers this season.
26:03
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, coach.
26:05
Speaker 6: Thank you guys. I appreciate you, miss you and I
26:07
Speaker 6: hope all as well. And thanks for having me on.
26:09
Speaker 2: Thanks for coming on.
26:10
Speaker 9: Can you have a good emaiing, Thanks you too.
26:12
Speaker 2: Take care all right, ladies and gentlemen, we shall be
26:15
Speaker 2: right back and uh we'll be ready to go. All right,
26:20
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27:46
Speaker 3: Now back to the conversation.
27:50
Speaker 4: All right, ladies and gentlemen, we are back and Hollis
27:53
Speaker 4: Lewis will be introducing our next guests.
27:57
Speaker 7: All right, so we have another special guests on again.
28:00
Speaker 7: Shout out to coach Pat Kirklin from WVUP. We have
28:05
Speaker 7: now again. I might mess this up, doctor Swayin. So, yeah,
28:09
Speaker 7: the assistant executive director for the WVSSAC AM I correct,
28:14
Speaker 7: that is correct. Okay, So this is a I had
28:17
Speaker 7: no chance that I'm glad you had. So this is
28:20
Speaker 7: a new position. Previously, you were the principal at Saint
28:25
Speaker 7: Albans High School. You're alma mater.
28:27
Speaker 2: So what attracted you to this position was very organic.
28:31
Speaker 10: It certainly wasn't on my radar or some vision board
28:34
Speaker 10: or a trajectory of where I thought my professional career
28:37
Speaker 10: would take me. But as I served in the capacity
28:40
Speaker 10: of principal at St. Alban's High School last year from
28:43
Speaker 10: twenty twenty four to twenty twenty five, I did have
28:46
Speaker 10: the opportunity to serve on the wv ssac's Board of director. Yes,
28:50
Speaker 10: I was very honored and privileged that our body of
28:54
Speaker 10: principles in the member schools nominated me and I was
28:57
Speaker 10: elected to that position. That position is one of several
29:02
Speaker 10: principles each represented across the regions of our state where
29:05
Speaker 10: we sit on the board of Directors to make decisions
29:09
Speaker 10: even in the student appeal process. So I got to
29:12
Speaker 10: see a lot of the backside and the inner workings
29:14
Speaker 10: and meet some of the administrative staff at the Parkersburg
29:17
Speaker 10: office understand those rules a little bit more. One who
29:21
Speaker 10: is a mentor even through Kinnall County Schools with me
29:24
Speaker 10: and my career is doctor Cindy Daniel, who previously served
29:27
Speaker 10: as one of the assistant executive directors, and upon her retirement,
29:31
Speaker 10: I began asking her questions about her position and what
29:34
Speaker 10: it entailed, and when the opportunity presented itself, I thought, well,
29:39
Speaker 10: let me see if maybe this is the next step
29:42
Speaker 10: that is in God's plan for my life, and the
29:44
Speaker 10: next step of serving our great state of West Virginia,
29:47
Speaker 10: but also still being in the capacity of education and
29:51
Speaker 10: serving young people and just truly what I've always been
29:54
Speaker 10: passionate about, of encouraging young people to get involved in
29:57
Speaker 10: school in something not just lots of activities, and we
30:02
Speaker 10: do it. I mean, you see WVSSAC you think of
30:05
Speaker 10: sports in our state tournaments, because that's what really you know,
30:08
Speaker 10: gets a lot of the publicity as it should, but
30:11
Speaker 10: we do. We sponsor robotics and band and we're looking
30:16
Speaker 10: in the future to hopefully sanction and sponsor more activities
30:20
Speaker 10: that fall into just co curricular and extracurricular even outside
30:23
Speaker 10: the realm of sports.
30:25
Speaker 2: So what specifically would your position entail.
30:29
Speaker 10: I'm one of two assistant excuse me, three assistant executive directors.
30:34
Speaker 10: Two of us, mister Chris Wells and I are new
30:37
Speaker 10: to the staff. Mister Dan Comer had previously and still
30:40
Speaker 10: serves as assistant executive director. We're each assigned certain sports
30:45
Speaker 10: where we are in care of helping to facilitate and
30:49
Speaker 10: run those state tournaments. We meet with coaching committees from
30:53
Speaker 10: said sports. We're that liaison between that sport and the
30:57
Speaker 10: clinicians of that sport to support not just coaches and
31:02
Speaker 10: our principals at our member schools over those sports, but
31:05
Speaker 10: also officials. So my assigned sports are cheer, volleyball, swim,
31:10
Speaker 10: and tennis. Mister Wells is over basketball and football and
31:16
Speaker 10: baseball also banned. Mister Dan Comer is over cross country soccer, wrestling,
31:24
Speaker 10: and track. And mister Bankston, Jason Bankston. He is our
31:28
Speaker 10: new director of compliance. It's a new position that was
31:31
Speaker 10: added completely when mister Ryan assumed the position of executive director,
31:36
Speaker 10: and he is going to be over golf and softball.
31:38
Speaker 10: So we're spread out in that way.
31:40
Speaker 4: Have you found what is the challenging piece of your
31:44
Speaker 4: particular role? Have you kind of already discovered what that
31:48
Speaker 4: is and how that's going.
31:51
Speaker 2: To work for you?
31:52
Speaker 10: At this point in time, it's not so much challenging
31:55
Speaker 10: as it is just exciting because I'm learning my role
31:59
Speaker 10: and learning wow, what has been done perfectly that We're
32:02
Speaker 10: just going to keep going and grow, what could be new,
32:05
Speaker 10: what could be more efficient? So I'm just in this
32:08
Speaker 10: learning phase and this exciting phase of just taking on
32:12
Speaker 10: just the challenge of learning. You know, not necessarily anything
32:15
Speaker 10: has I can't pinpoint one thing that's been challenging. Of course,
32:19
Speaker 10: I did just serve five years as a building level
32:22
Speaker 10: high school, so you.
32:24
Speaker 4: You kind of already have a background of it anyway,
32:27
Speaker 4: a little bit of background from it anyway, Well.
32:29
Speaker 10: Certainly I'm blessed that I've had a lot of perspectives
32:33
Speaker 10: that I do think is going to lend itself to
32:36
Speaker 10: hopefully success in the position, you know, as a student
32:38
Speaker 10: athlete myself. When I served as teacher a Capital high school,
32:42
Speaker 10: when the eight years I was there, I was able
32:44
Speaker 10: to coach the sports that i'd played in high school soccer, basketball, tennis.
32:50
Speaker 10: Of course, married to a pretty good coach, y legendary.
32:55
Speaker 10: And then of course being an assistant principal and a
32:59
Speaker 10: building principle, you know, supervising and supporting coaches, supervising games
33:05
Speaker 10: and all the athletics and extracurricular activities. And of course
33:09
Speaker 10: I'm blessed to have three children of our own and
33:12
Speaker 10: they are all involved in athletics and extra curricula.
33:15
Speaker 2: Y'all got it covered. So wear lots of hats, so
33:18
Speaker 2: sports mom too. And that's and that's that's my question
33:22
Speaker 2: right there.
33:23
Speaker 5: I mean, I'm amazed when I see all the things
33:25
Speaker 5: that you're doing now now you are still actively principal.
33:28
Speaker 10: That is incorrect. This is a full time job again.
33:31
Speaker 10: It will, I'm sure, get more challenging.
33:36
Speaker 2: Position for this one.
33:38
Speaker 8: It was.
33:38
Speaker 10: It was very bittersweet. I served Connall County Schools for
33:41
Speaker 10: twenty one years in the multiple roles that led me
33:44
Speaker 10: to this point. But it is a unique opportunity, and
33:47
Speaker 10: again I felt, after much prayer and consideration, that it
33:51
Speaker 10: was the next step in God's plan to continue to
33:54
Speaker 10: be able to serve our great state and our students
33:56
Speaker 10: and in our schools in a broader capacity. So, oh, yes,
34:00
Speaker 10: I did have to resign from the principal. That's high
34:03
Speaker 10: school that had to be tiped in order to take
34:05
Speaker 10: on this position.
34:06
Speaker 5: Yeah, and you also, and I don't know if you've
34:09
Speaker 5: mentioned this already, I may have missed it, were you
34:12
Speaker 5: VP of the Mountain State Athletic Conference Board of Control?
34:16
Speaker 5: What would what would that position that that that kind
34:18
Speaker 5: of intrigued me when a board of control, it just
34:20
Speaker 5: sounded really like strong, Like what was that about.
34:23
Speaker 10: The Mountain State Athletic Conference encompasses a lot of Kenaal
34:27
Speaker 10: County schools, but also Cable County and Putnam County schools
34:31
Speaker 10: predominantly three A four A schools, so your larger schools.
34:35
Speaker 10: It's been a very competitive athletic conference historical in the
34:39
Speaker 10: state of West Virginia. And they have a board of
34:43
Speaker 10: control and it's very almost like a microcosm of the
34:46
Speaker 10: wv s SAC. But it just provides that opportunity for
34:50
Speaker 10: schools to have that interscholastic competition, provide m SAC tournaments,
34:56
Speaker 10: provide officials for said sports through their board of organization
35:00
Speaker 10: as a constitution and bylaws, you know, and it's just
35:03
Speaker 10: another way to support again that microcosm of an athletic
35:07
Speaker 10: conference within our state. And I was vice president before
35:12
Speaker 10: again having to resigned from principalship moving on to the WVSSAC,
35:17
Speaker 10: I couldn't continue still serving.
35:19
Speaker 2: I'm sure that leads me to my question.
35:22
Speaker 7: As far as I know, last year when they made
35:25
Speaker 7: the four A divisions, particularly in football, there was a
35:29
Speaker 7: lot of disagreements about the calculation and how they did
35:32
Speaker 7: it and everything like that. But one of the questions
35:34
Speaker 7: that I had is that I know last year, and
35:37
Speaker 7: I believe this year too, in the MSAC they still
35:41
Speaker 7: had far as a mix of Quad A and three
35:45
Speaker 7: A schools. So in the future would that be worked
35:48
Speaker 7: out where you're going to have just single conference, single
35:53
Speaker 7: level conferences or would it continue.
35:56
Speaker 2: Just to be a mix.
35:57
Speaker 10: As I was leaving, of course, their last meeting was
36:00
Speaker 10: July and to August that may have made some different decisions,
36:04
Speaker 10: but what we were trying to do to uphold the conference,
36:07
Speaker 10: maintain the conference so that it could maybe even grow
36:10
Speaker 10: and include more three A and four A schools. In fact,
36:14
Speaker 10: over the end of the last school year, Parkersburg South
36:18
Speaker 10: Rejoin joined US, so that was another four A school
36:22
Speaker 10: but they were going to continue to build the schedules
36:24
Speaker 10: for predominantly three A schools playing three A four A
36:27
Speaker 10: schools playing four A schools, but at least one crossover
36:31
Speaker 10: game or two crossover games within the schedule. Prior to
36:35
Speaker 10: even the change in classifications. They the MSAC did make
36:40
Speaker 10: the decision to reduce the number of total conference games
36:43
Speaker 10: since the membership had declined a little bit, but they're
36:48
Speaker 10: trying to be very flexible to uphold the conference in
36:51
Speaker 10: order to just protect just the wonderful things that it
36:55
Speaker 10: can provide for those schools in that region, in that area.
36:59
Speaker 7: So you projected like that's gonna be something that's going
37:02
Speaker 7: to be maintained, you think, even though there are different classifications.
37:05
Speaker 10: That was the discussion and that was the collaboration that
37:09
Speaker 10: was really taking place among the principals and athletic directors
37:12
Speaker 10: of those member schools in the MSAC to do what
37:15
Speaker 10: they can to be flexible and keep it together moving forward.
37:19
Speaker 2: And so in the four A and three A, I
37:23
Speaker 2: know that there's some crossover.
37:26
Speaker 4: Is there a way to sort of I'll say, protect
37:31
Speaker 4: a three A school from a four A school that
37:34
Speaker 4: they just you know, the four A is just really
37:37
Speaker 4: a good team and maybe they just try to schedule
37:40
Speaker 4: a game. Is there any way be cause I think
37:43
Speaker 4: to me, I think safety in those situations? Do you
37:49
Speaker 4: all play a role in trying to determine like should
37:53
Speaker 4: this team be playing this team? Like could a four
37:55
Speaker 4: A team play a two A team.
37:58
Speaker 10: We don't have any contraction I over in terms of
38:01
Speaker 10: what a school, who a school wants to schedule as
38:05
Speaker 10: far as four A versus three A in football, basketball, volleyball, softball,
38:11
Speaker 10: whatever sportver they be. You know, we don't govern the
38:13
Speaker 10: coaches and decisions of what other conference to maybe be
38:17
Speaker 10: a part of. As you know, there's the MSAC conference,
38:20
Speaker 10: there's the Cardinal Conference. You know, it is up to
38:23
Speaker 10: the individual principal, athletic director and coach of whatever said
38:27
Speaker 10: sport to determine their schedule and who they want to play.
38:30
Speaker 10: One benefit of being part of the MSAC is working
38:34
Speaker 10: together to schedule games that would be better aligned to
38:39
Speaker 10: make sure you know, safety and success happens, you know,
38:43
Speaker 10: with both the three A and four A schools that
38:45
Speaker 10: are involved.
38:46
Speaker 7: Okay, yeah, and I just had a question to it
38:49
Speaker 7: just because you got sports like volleyball, tennis, different sports
38:53
Speaker 7: like a sports that are more that our girls are playing.
38:58
Speaker 7: How do we do a better job of bringing more
39:03
Speaker 7: light and publicity to girls sports, particularly in high school.
39:08
Speaker 10: Well, I think it's just making sure that you provide
39:10
Speaker 10: those opportunities and even if a school has a sport.
39:13
Speaker 10: Middle schools, I think is a important talking piece with this,
39:17
Speaker 10: because not all the state level commissions that you know,
39:21
Speaker 10: through our National Federation of High School Sports that's kind
39:24
Speaker 10: of our governing body of all our state commissions. Even Kentucky,
39:28
Speaker 10: for example, they don't govern their middle school sports. We
39:33
Speaker 10: do in West Virginia. So that's a good starting point.
39:36
Speaker 10: For example, if a volleyball team hasn't always been at
39:39
Speaker 10: a middle school, how can you work with even elementary
39:43
Speaker 10: schools youth leagues and say let's start a girl's volleyball league.
39:47
Speaker 10: I know recently in St. Albans A girl's volleyball league
39:49
Speaker 10: was started and that gained interest in that sport that is,
39:53
Speaker 10: you know, more exclusive to just our females, but also
39:56
Speaker 10: just just introducing girls to other sports. It's exciting. Our
39:59
Speaker 10: golf invitational or girls golf Invitational cross just right around
40:03
Speaker 10: the corner, and we have increased in participation. So just
40:08
Speaker 10: maybe offering more invitationals with some of the sports we
40:12
Speaker 10: Lacrosse is a sport that's up and coming on both
40:15
Speaker 10: the girls and the boys side. You hear a lot
40:17
Speaker 10: more about it, and what's great about that is the
40:21
Speaker 10: opportunity it provides. When you choose to become you know,
40:24
Speaker 10: sanctioned or to become a part of the WVS SAC.
40:28
Speaker 10: You have to accept, you know, of course the rules.
40:31
Speaker 10: And one thing that's unique about lacrosse right now because
40:34
Speaker 10: of again just wanting girls to participate guys to participate
40:37
Speaker 10: in the new sport, is the teams that are fielded
40:40
Speaker 10: are from different areas schools, So you have to get
40:44
Speaker 10: enough participation in enough individual schools to really sanction that sport.
40:50
Speaker 2: One of the things that and I'm curious about what
40:54
Speaker 2: you think about this.
40:56
Speaker 4: The city of South Charleston, like, you know, we we
41:00
Speaker 4: sponsor a lot of different teams in the youth sports.
41:04
Speaker 2: But one of the things that we I think that
41:06
Speaker 2: we're looking at is.
41:10
Speaker 4: Certain sports football specifically, a lot of we're not getting
41:14
Speaker 4: a lot of participation in that.
41:16
Speaker 2: So the more sports you have, the more you spread
41:19
Speaker 2: out kids to to other to another sport.
41:25
Speaker 4: Is there any way that you all could see how
41:28
Speaker 4: the how you would balance that at whether it be
41:32
Speaker 4: at the high school level, middle school level, like to
41:34
Speaker 4: make sure that we that you don't run out of
41:37
Speaker 4: kids in a specific sport. And I don't know if
41:40
Speaker 4: that's like saying hurt it, how to schedule it like
41:45
Speaker 4: without hurting another sport?
41:46
Speaker 10: I guess I think just reflecting on when sports take
41:50
Speaker 10: place in sports seasons, I mean, I think we all
41:53
Speaker 10: can maybe remember here when girls and boys basketball were
41:56
Speaker 10: not in the same season. Girls basketball was a sport,
41:59
Speaker 10: boys BA was a winter sport, and then they moved
42:02
Speaker 10: them together. And I think with volleyball then being in
42:05
Speaker 10: the fall and being a main fall sport for females,
42:08
Speaker 10: then sometimes then travel volleyball starts in the winter, and
42:11
Speaker 10: maybe some of those girls instead of playing basketball or
42:13
Speaker 10: playing volleyball. And that's not to say that that shouldn't happen.
42:17
Speaker 10: But it just take you to look at when things happen,
42:19
Speaker 10: when those opportunities are, you know, and if they are
42:22
Speaker 10: spread out, then then girls. If that's what we're focused
42:25
Speaker 10: on here in the conversation. For the point of the question,
42:28
Speaker 10: don't have to choose between sports. I'll give you kind
42:32
Speaker 10: of a unique example that you know certainly is exciting
42:36
Speaker 10: flag football for females. Yeah, I think it has been
42:41
Speaker 10: talked about and certainly when would you offer that? And
42:45
Speaker 10: in a roundtable discussion at our conference, just as our
42:50
Speaker 10: new hires, myself included, we were able to go at
42:53
Speaker 10: the very end of June to Chicago to our NFHS
42:56
Speaker 10: National Conference, and at one of the roundtable discussions, just
42:59
Speaker 10: beating the minds of the different assistant executive directors representing
43:03
Speaker 10: the other states all across the nation, we were talking
43:05
Speaker 10: about flag football, and that was my question, when do
43:08
Speaker 10: you offer that sport? You know, I would have absolutely
43:11
Speaker 10: loved to pawn and you know, but would have had
43:14
Speaker 10: to choose between soccer and flag football, or basketball and
43:17
Speaker 10: flag football, or tennis and flag football, or maybe I
43:20
Speaker 10: could balance both of those. They said they've had the
43:23
Speaker 10: most success offering it in the spring, and surprisingly, but
43:27
Speaker 10: maybe not so surprisingly in my opinion, a lot of
43:30
Speaker 10: your cheerleaders and the especially those that are on the
43:33
Speaker 10: sideline at those football games, since that is they're seeing
43:37
Speaker 10: new athletes to this new sport because they have that
43:41
Speaker 10: opportunity to do that in the spring, where a lot
43:44
Speaker 10: of the girls that have maybe already taken to soccer
43:48
Speaker 10: or volleyball or basketball maybe aren't as interested in trying
43:51
Speaker 10: another sport in the spring. So what's been encouraging about
43:55
Speaker 10: that moving forward is you're getting newer athletes, athletes that
44:00
Speaker 10: haven't done another kind of predominant girls sports. So it
44:03
Speaker 10: is adding and not detracting from the other sports opportunities
44:07
Speaker 10: that are out there. So that's exciting.
44:09
Speaker 7: See, I would I would have thought you had the
44:11
Speaker 7: girls flag football just during football season, so you play
44:14
Speaker 7: like you play like the girls game. You can play
44:16
Speaker 7: like the football game, you know.
44:18
Speaker 4: And and well and I think like for us in
44:21
Speaker 4: you sports, I think we could, we could, we could
44:25
Speaker 4: do that. But I to me, like, I think I
44:30
Speaker 4: want them to have a season to where there's nothing
44:34
Speaker 4: a parent that so the parent doesn't have to try
44:37
Speaker 4: to split what game they're.
44:39
Speaker 2: Going to and I think with travel sports that that's
44:42
Speaker 2: kind of probably travel sports is really an issue.
44:47
Speaker 7: And that's kind of the question that I had to
44:50
Speaker 7: build on that is that being a sanctioned body. And
44:53
Speaker 7: to your point, I've been in other states where again
44:56
Speaker 7: middle school is not sanctioned, it's just high school.
44:58
Speaker 2: West Virginia is unique where we sank down to middle school.
45:01
Speaker 7: So with the peripheration of travel sports, what sort of
45:06
Speaker 7: the future that you've guys kind of been discussing that
45:09
Speaker 7: you can disclose to us around balancing that sanctioning within
45:14
Speaker 7: the setting of the school, but also acknowledging that travel
45:17
Speaker 7: sports are here.
45:18
Speaker 10: Well, we absolutely want to promote education based athletics. I mean,
45:21
Speaker 10: that's what we stand for.
45:22
Speaker 6: I like that.
45:23
Speaker 2: I like that terminology.
45:24
Speaker 10: That is actually a campaign that is just being reaffirmed
45:29
Speaker 10: by our national Federation and it's called Protect the Purpose
45:32
Speaker 10: and we're going to do some more things with that
45:34
Speaker 10: as we continue this year. And what's exciting too, just
45:37
Speaker 10: to hit on that just a little bit, is we're
45:39
Speaker 10: getting ready to celebrate one hundred years of being aligned
45:43
Speaker 10: with our national Federation. The WVSSAC has been in cooperation
45:47
Speaker 10: with NFHS for one hundred years this year, systems nineteen
45:50
Speaker 10: twenty five. So protect The purpose is just reminding everybody
45:54
Speaker 10: that you know, nationwide we have over eight million kids
45:57
Speaker 10: involved in education based activities, predominantly sports, but also those
46:01
Speaker 10: co curricular activities band, robotics, speech and debate in other places,
46:06
Speaker 10: you know, show a choir, whatever it may be. But
46:09
Speaker 10: seven percent do that in college and only two percent
46:13
Speaker 10: get that scholarship. So it's really about, hey, we're working
46:17
Speaker 10: with cooperation citizenship building our leaders of tomorrow that they
46:21
Speaker 10: get that experience so that it can carry them into
46:24
Speaker 10: whatever they choose to do. Get getting back to your question,
46:28
Speaker 10: how we navigate that in conjunction with travel sports. We
46:31
Speaker 10: certainly want students and student athletes in particular to develop,
46:36
Speaker 10: and if travel sports is a part of that development,
46:39
Speaker 10: that can be a great thing. So in order for
46:41
Speaker 10: them to coexist, we want to still promote, hey, rep
46:45
Speaker 10: your school be a part of education based Yeah. Yeah,
46:49
Speaker 10: but at the same time make sure that you know
46:53
Speaker 10: we again carefully place when seasons are and understand and
46:58
Speaker 10: communicate clearly those rules about non participation sports. I guess
47:03
Speaker 10: I'll use my daughter as an example because that's easy.
47:05
Speaker 10: She's a freshman at night he high school. She participates
47:08
Speaker 10: in multiple sports right now, her sport of choice in
47:11
Speaker 10: her season which is her favorite soccer. She does have
47:15
Speaker 10: a goal of playing that after high school at the
47:18
Speaker 10: college level, and in communicating that to her father and I,
47:22
Speaker 10: we chose to allow her to be participating in a
47:26
Speaker 10: travel club club team WVFC, and it's been wonders for
47:30
Speaker 10: her development. And it happened, of course, in the off
47:35
Speaker 10: season of the school based soccer team, and so she's
47:38
Speaker 10: still allowed to be a part of that team, but
47:40
Speaker 10: she can't participate again in that team until the completion
47:44
Speaker 10: of her established school season. And I think just per community,
47:48
Speaker 10: which it does, it coincides with when travel soccer starts
47:52
Speaker 10: back up as far as they're competitions in the spring.
47:56
Speaker 10: But teaching and educating our coaches are our principles or
48:00
Speaker 10: coaches or athletic directors, and so that they can then
48:03
Speaker 10: share that communication and hopefully we can continue to share
48:06
Speaker 10: more communication with parents in putting our information in more
48:11
Speaker 10: easily accessible pockets of whether it be social media or website,
48:15
Speaker 10: and just again continue to make that better so they
48:18
Speaker 10: understand they can coexist and it does benefit your kids
48:22
Speaker 10: to do both, and that they can do both, and
48:24
Speaker 10: that's okay. You don't have to make that choice.
48:27
Speaker 7: So we are not going to let you leave without
48:30
Speaker 7: asking one question about that transfer rule. So we have
48:34
Speaker 7: an expert in the room. We got somebody, so we
48:37
Speaker 7: even had a little discussion about it last week as
48:39
Speaker 7: far as how many transfer because it seems to be
48:42
Speaker 7: just a little bit of confusing left with it. So
48:46
Speaker 7: how many transfers can you have? Can you transfer coming
48:49
Speaker 7: from middle school to high school? And then are you
48:52
Speaker 7: alloted another one or is it just one total?
48:55
Speaker 2: Now it is one total, So just to be clear,
48:59
Speaker 2: so that transfer.
49:00
Speaker 7: Like if you were supposed to go to John as GW,
49:02
Speaker 7: you go from John Abs the capitol, that counts as
49:04
Speaker 7: a transfer, correct, okay.
49:06
Speaker 10: And even coming out of middle school, it used to
49:09
Speaker 10: be that you could go to whatever high school you
49:11
Speaker 10: wanted to go to used to be and then if
49:14
Speaker 10: you were unhappy or you just said, hey, you know again,
49:17
Speaker 10: I'll use my daughter Isabella. Let's say I'm still the
49:19
Speaker 10: principal at Saint Albans High School. So she went to
49:21
Speaker 10: comm school with mom. We live in Nitro, that's her
49:24
Speaker 10: feeder area. She went to aj Middle School, she should
49:26
Speaker 10: go to Nitro High School. She decided she wanted to
49:30
Speaker 10: go to Saint Albans, that's fine. If she transfers back
49:34
Speaker 10: to Nitro. This is as a ninth grader. If she
49:36
Speaker 10: transfers back to Nitro High School, transfers to her home school,
49:40
Speaker 10: she has to sit through sixty five because her one
49:43
Speaker 10: transfer choice was eighth Green going into ninth grade. And
49:46
Speaker 10: that's sometimes still the heart of the confusion and our
49:48
Speaker 10: Rules Clinics Tour and our Regional Principal Tour because mister
49:53
Speaker 10: Ryan and our assistant executive directors, we go out in
49:57
Speaker 10: our clinicians and we do coaching clinics, and we do
50:00
Speaker 10: informational meetings for principles all across the state.
50:03
Speaker 2: Are there any of those sort of clinics for parents?
50:06
Speaker 6: No?
50:07
Speaker 2: Okay, is that something that could possibly just down the
50:10
Speaker 2: line in the future.
50:11
Speaker 10: I'm not gonna say it's impossible, certainly, you know, I'm
50:14
Speaker 10: very grateful to mister Wayne Ryan, who again selected me
50:18
Speaker 10: for this position, is doing a great job, and I
50:21
Speaker 10: think has a great vision for continuing to keep its
50:24
Speaker 10: strength and also move it forward. So I'm certainly not
50:26
Speaker 10: going to speak on his behalf or say no but
50:30
Speaker 10: our primary goal was to make sure that our principals
50:33
Speaker 10: are educated as well as our coaches and athletic administrators,
50:37
Speaker 10: so then they can be that liaison parents because ideally
50:41
Speaker 10: they're more accessible to parents. Yes, sure, and it's their
50:44
Speaker 10: school and their community, and they can deliver that message
50:47
Speaker 10: to you know again who's right there in their backyard
50:51
Speaker 10: where it's you know what happens sometimes in the summer
50:55
Speaker 10: if the doors of the school aren't open and maybe
50:57
Speaker 10: you can't have that conversation with that principle or that
51:00
Speaker 10: the led director, then you don't know where to turn.
51:04
Speaker 7: Yeah, So just to be clear, so just you get
51:07
Speaker 7: one transfersal with the trans So that's whether you're in
51:09
Speaker 7: high school currently now you go somewhere else, or you're
51:11
Speaker 7: in middle school and then you're going to your you're
51:14
Speaker 7: out of district school. And where can people, parents, individuals
51:19
Speaker 7: get more information about the wv S SAC rules, different
51:23
Speaker 7: things of that nature.
51:24
Speaker 10: W v S SAC dot org or website. You can
51:27
Speaker 10: just google the letters and it pops right up. We
51:30
Speaker 10: are working actually even today we're having meetings about how
51:35
Speaker 10: to improve the functionality and accessibility of our website and
51:38
Speaker 10: the content that we put on our website so it
51:40
Speaker 10: can be that hub not just for our principals and
51:43
Speaker 10: coaches and officials and athletic administrators, but also parents. So
51:48
Speaker 10: we do hope in the future. We've been working really
51:51
Speaker 10: hard out of the office and you'll see these coming
51:54
Speaker 10: out soon. For one pagers on those RULs such as
51:58
Speaker 10: the transfer rule. There will be a one pager on ANIL,
52:02
Speaker 10: There'll be a one pager on flex days. There will
52:05
Speaker 10: be a one pager on what I talked about a
52:07
Speaker 10: little bit with nonschool participation, your travel, your club, your
52:10
Speaker 10: all star participation, and how that works with not against
52:14
Speaker 10: your participants, summary education based athletics, repping, your team, being
52:19
Speaker 10: a part of your school in your athletics or your
52:22
Speaker 10: activities you know, band, robotics or otherwise. So we're working
52:26
Speaker 10: to continue to get the message out so that it's
52:29
Speaker 10: clear to all our stakeholders.
52:31
Speaker 4: I'm going to I'm going to say this as we
52:33
Speaker 4: as we kind of close it up. We've had this
52:35
Speaker 4: conversation before, and I'm just talking about football and particularly Okay,
52:43
Speaker 4: because we've had I know people who do travel football,
52:49
Speaker 4: and there was a conversation about wanting to play travel
52:52
Speaker 4: football and also still play school ball, whether it be
52:56
Speaker 4: high school or middle school. I think that that's something
53:01
Speaker 4: that should never be able to happen as a as
53:05
Speaker 4: a football player for life and knowing the issues that
53:10
Speaker 4: come with it, like we're setting our kids. We're setting
53:14
Speaker 4: kids up for a really bad future with all the contact.
53:19
Speaker 4: So if I would say that just to get it
53:23
Speaker 4: out and say, football is not the one you can
53:26
Speaker 4: play on Thursday and then come back play it on
53:29
Speaker 4: Saturday and play.
53:30
Speaker 2: Four games or three games on Saturday, travel football is
53:35
Speaker 2: not in its true.
53:37
Speaker 4: Yes, And to me, I just think that in that conversation,
53:41
Speaker 4: I think you have to realize you have to because
53:44
Speaker 4: there's not a way to really look at youth or
53:47
Speaker 4: even maybe high school.
53:48
Speaker 2: You have to look long term and then look what
53:51
Speaker 2: all of that head trauma is coming with the athlete.
53:58
Speaker 10: And that can even speak in multiple sports, but certainly
54:01
Speaker 10: football being as unique as it is in the physicality
54:03
Speaker 10: of the sport and what it takes in the level
54:06
Speaker 10: of competition that you have if it's played in its
54:09
Speaker 10: true form as you noted, But what's specific to our
54:11
Speaker 10: non school participation rule for team sports and even individual sports,
54:15
Speaker 10: but especially our team sports, is you cannot play that
54:19
Speaker 10: travel sport during the established sports season and still be
54:22
Speaker 10: eligible to play for your travel team and or your
54:27
Speaker 10: school team. So again, going back to my daughter as example,
54:30
Speaker 10: while she is participating and practicing, she's at practice right now,
54:34
Speaker 10: you know what, She's practicing and participating for Nitro High
54:37
Speaker 10: School and representing her school as a part of that
54:40
Speaker 10: that interscholastic team. She cannot practice, she cannot compete. She
54:46
Speaker 10: cannot go on a weekend and play for that travel
54:49
Speaker 10: soccer team during her school sports season, and that would
54:52
Speaker 10: extend to whatever sport that is, including travel football. All right, thanks,
55:00
Speaker 10: shame the opportunity, nice speaking with you.
55:03
Speaker 5: Thank you very much.
55:04
Speaker 4: All Right, ladies and gentlemen, we hope you enjoyed the
55:06
Speaker 4: show and we will be back again next week.
55:09
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