Today was something I had not done before. I was in charge of putting together the team's defensive schedule for the coaches and the equipment managers. I sat in on the coaches meeting this morning and wrote down the times of the periods so that I would have the correct information for the schedules for the practice tomorrow. I compiled the times, periods, and time length of the periods into a document and printed the schedule off. I watched the practice today, which wasn't anything too strenuous physically for the guys, hence the soft gear. It was really a mental day in terms of understanding TSU's offensive tendencies as well as a good amount on time spent on special teams. Tomorrow's practice, seen above, will be more of the same.
Today, I went away from the recruiting aspect and gathered the information needed to put together the travel schedule for the team's game this week at conference rival Tennessee State University. As someone that's very punctual and attentive to detail, it was important to me to get the correct information in terms of when the team leaves, is expected to arrive, and everything in between. It's so interesting how teams are very advantageous of the time they have during the game week in order to put their best product on the field on game day. I began making these itineraries for the team to be distributed later. I also got a peek at today's practice as they finally played a conference opponent on the road after their win last week at home against OVC rival Tennessee Tech.
Today, I continued the research on the recruits that I previously had started. The total number of players I had found information on was 187 in all. The players were from Middle as well as East Tennessee. As I wrapped up the last few, I went back and made sure I did not miss any information on the players I had already looked up in case they had new offers or even had committed somewhere. I learned it is important to keep up-to-date with the recruiting because things can change on a whim, and if a player you're going hard after ends up committing somewhere and you're late to find out, you could miss out on another guy that could be just as solid as the other player you were going after. Coach Hankins told me that at some point, he will probably get me to contact each of his recruits he's really looking at in order to keep them updated on where they stand in terms of receiving an offer from UTM.
Today was the day before the Skyhawks take on their Ohio Valley Conference rival Tennessee Tech University. I, again, was working with Coach Hankins in recruiting. Today was particularly fun because I had to research the recruits and their offers that have been made to them or if they have at this point committed to a school to play football, or in some cases, baseball. I used the ESPN websites, 247 Sports website, and the players Twitter accounts to see if they have been offered or committed to a school at this point in time. This is so that if they have an offer from a school in the Skyhawks conference, they can make contact with them and talk to them to see where they are in terms of committing. If there’s a player both schools are interested in, knowing a rival sort of lights a fire under the coaches to get their guy to commit over their conference rival. I was able to find the higher ranked guys pretty easily on ESPN and 247 Sports, but I had to dig on some players’ Twitter accounts in order to find out if they have been offered. It was rather time consuming, but a lot of the guys had tweeted their offers or commits had they had either. Next week when I go back, I will continue what I have been doing the last few visits in order to wrap up all of his recruits.
Today, my visit consisted of more of the same. However, this time, my job was to research every potential recruit to see if they have a Twitter account. In order to be able to track them down, I would use Google to search for their name and twitter. If they had one listed, I had to write down their twitter handle. Coaches use this to see what kind of material the potential recruits send out. If I was unable to find their accounts by using google, if multiple guys from the same school were being recruited, I would find one of those guys twitter accounts and look through their list of followers and who they follow in order to find the guy I was originally looking for. I was able to find maybe a dozen guys this way. It was somewhat difficult because some didn’t use their real names and used nicknames instead, and I was able to verify it was them by either their prior tweets, their twitter avatar, or their header if they had their jersey on. On my next visit to the mentorship, the working in the recruiting will continue.
Today, I was able to get some hands on work with the Skyhawks Assistant Head Coach, Jordon Hankins, in the recruiting area of the team. Coach Hankins gave me a list of his recruits that he is looking at in order for me to research some information on each of them. He recruits the middle Tennessee area, so I knew some of the schools where some of the guys were from, so it made it easier to find information on those guys. Today, I was to research if any of the guys had film posted to the Internet on websites like Hudl or Maxpreps. If they had video, I had to check to make sure that the film was from their senior season. If they have film, I made note of where they play their high school games and what site or sites the film is on. This is to help the coach narrow down where he has to look in order to find film on his potential recruits. Over the next several visits, I will continue to work with Coach Hankins in the research of potential recruits.
For a few hours I observed the coaches breakdown the film and grade the tape from their game at Hawaii in which the Skyhawks came up short in, 41-36. They broke it into offensive and defensive groups and had each individual coach grade their players in their perspective positions. I'd always wondered how they graded the films so quick, and this made more sense after seeing how it's done. From seeing the film, they could have won the game and they out-gained Hawaii in yards and time of possession, but they had one more turnover in a bad spot on the field, and it came back to haunt them at the end of the game. The film guys were breaking down the film of their next opponent, Bacone College, an NAIA school from Muskogee, Oklahoma, whom they play Saturday, September 17 at home at Hardy Graham Stadium at 2:00 PM local time.
I noticed how they had two guys in the team's film room, and one each were breaking down the offensive plays and defensive plays from their previous two games against Missouri S & T and Robert Morris, games in which they were on the losing end of, 62-14 and 48-6, respectively. When the film breakdown is done, all of the coaches will be able to access it on the team's server for use in individual and team meetings in order to prepare for the game Saturday afternoon. As I mentioned in my initial blog post, today I arrived at the football building to set up the game for the high school football game that was played there. The Skyhawks field is also home to their local high school, the Westview Chargers. Westview was 0-3 going into the game tonight against Battle Ground Academy, a school from Franklin, Tennessee, which is just 20 miles south of Nashville. Hours before the game began, I went around the field and set up the pylons in the endzones. Other things that I completed were taking out the chains and first down markers and placing them in the location where they would be used by the officials for the game. In addition to that, I got to put the U.S. flag on the flagpole and raise it prior to the game. It was a cool experience because I had never done that before. I realized that there is a lot that goes into preparing for any game. The equipment managers there told me that they essentially do the same things prior to the high school games there as well as the Skyhawks games. Another task I completed was turning on the scoreboard and ensuring it was in working order because sometimes in the past, the scoreboard did not want to work properly. After the game concluded, which Westview lost, 31-10, I went around the field and took up the equipment I had previously helped set out for the game. In addition to that, I helped with the cleanup of the trash and other tasks that needed to be done, such as helping the guys that filmed the games carry their things into the football building. From this experience, I learned that there is so much that goes into putting on a football game, even a high school one, and that the people that get everything ready to go are underappreciated by those that don’t understand what all their job entails. Next week, I will be back to help the coaches with various things when the team arrives back from Hawaii.
My first day of my mentorship was today, and I spent the initial moments introducing myself and meeting a few of the coaches that I hadn’t previously met or worked with. It being Labor Day, the coaches wanted the players to be able to spend time with their families that afternoon and evening in their last padded practice before they leave for Hawaii Wednesday morning, so they held a practices quickly after I arrived. Throughout the practices, I walked around and observed how the practices were generally ran. From the stretches and warmups to the various drills during the thirteen period practice, I observed how the practice was smoothly designed and every period was building towards the next period in implementing the gameplan for this week’s opponent. The team began the practice and immediately spent a period on correcting the various errors that occurred in their Week One game at the University of Cincinnati. They missed multiple field goal attempts that could have stretched their initial lead and had many boneheaded penalties, so they spent a few minutes attempting field goals against a live defense to ensure that there are few to no flaws in their future special teams plays. The rest of the practice was mostly spent in position groups going over the week’s gameplan against Hawaii before they came together and ran 11-on-11 drills to conclude the day’s practice. As the practice went along and even as it concluded, I was in observation of all of the equipment managers and how they helped prepare the various drills for the day’s practice. I learned that the people that are helping “behind the scenes” that often go unnoticed by the average fan help a lot in contributing to the team’s success. They ensure that all drills are set up and ready to go so the coaches and players can get through the drills with minimal delay between the different periods. I ended my day by communicating with the Director of Football Operations on when my next day of observation will be and what I will be able to do and learn. My next day will be this Friday, September 9 as I help the Skyhawks staff prepare for and host their local high school’s football game which will be played on the Skyhawks home field.
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AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
November 2016
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