[Spirit100]

First, congrats to Collins; the coaches, players and community members/fans supporting them. Lots to like from what I saw of Collins. I'm sure we'll see a lot from Collins in the future. For such a young program, I was thoroughly impressed with everything I saw from Collins. Great job everyone connected with Collins football.

As to the bolded, it's a long answer.
To be honest, Dale and Highlands have a lot of things working in their favor. The Fort Thomas Junior Football League is where it all starts. Emphasizes participation above all other things. League does a lot to "make it fun", and face it, getting playing time is what makes it fun. Also helps that the season is relatively short by most standards. Parents don't dread their kids playing because the youth league season goes on for half the year. There is a limited number of practices per week and the practice length is limited. The league rules are oriented to one thing and one thing only: keep the young kids playing football. With all the other alternatives out there these days, it's not as easy as it sounds.

Dale and his assts. can't coach them up if they've quit playing the game because their youth football experiences were bad, or the season was too long and it prevented them from playing on the AAU basketball team, etc. Also the youth league's system of trying to evenly balance out the kids onto 4 or 5 teams means that each year, there are that many kids playing QB, etc. But even there, it's not just because of the pee wee program's rules that makes the pee wee league so important to Highlands' success. Fort Thomas is a rather geographically compact town. That makes it easier logistically, for youth age kids to play pee wee ball and for parents to attend practices and games to support their kids. The pee wee teams generally practice in areas close to where the players live. A lot of kids can ride bikes or walk early in the season to get to practice. Another factor making it "easy" to play pee wee football. While Fort Thomas is not the "rich" community some people think it is, a large percentage of the residents are middle class or above. That too makes it easier for kids to be able to participate in pee wee ball. Because of community support for the pee wee league, the fee to play pee wee is rather small. Again, another impediment to playing pee wee football isn't present.

Speaking of community support, it obviously extends to the high school team. With so many "alums" of past state championship teams living in the community, kids grow up hearing about their brothers, cousins, dads, uncles and grandfathers winning state championships. Such causes them to want to play football to accomplish what their relatives accomplished: win a state championship, particularly their senior year. Such causes them to stick with the game when times get rough (ie, lack of playing time they thought they should be getting; ridiculously difficult practices, conditioning and lifting sessions, etc). Sure quitting is still an option; but it is a very difficult option in FT because of the tradition and heritage. I've read time after time of very talented kids at other schools quitting football for various reasons. It's a very tough and demanding sport so I get it as to why some kids decide to give it up. It happens occassionally at Highlands too, but very, very rarely.

Coaches are also a factor. Dale gets a lot of credit for Highlands success and he most certainly should, but people too easily forget the assts. he has working for him. Weinrich as been the DC since 2002 and was on staff before then. Dill, Hall, Swope and Jones have been assts. at Highlands for a long time. Same with Turner, the O line coach. Yeah there is a some new blood added to the asst. coaching ranks occassionally, but there is a very large group of assts. that have been together at Highlands for a long time. They understand the "system" and work together in it very well. No new learning curve to be dealt with every few years. Dale has been the head coach since 1994, providing great stability and continuity to the program and system. He is also a player's coach. Not a yeller and screamer type coach. Quite to the contrary, he is a fun coach; a player's coach. In the years Dale has been the HC, I can't think of one player who's quit because of Dale or any other coach riding their butt, getting in their face, etc. As difficult as Highlands' practices are (and they truly are), Dale finds a way to make it fun. Perhaps it's his personality. His nickname in high school was "Smiley" because of his seemingly always present smile on his face. He's just a very easy guy and coach to like.

Let's talk about the system some. With approx a 100 kids on the team (as a result of the things mentioned above), even though Highlands is the smallest 4A school, Dale can run a system that truly is two platooned. A kid is either on offense or on defense. Once there, they don't even practice another position on the other side of the ball. The coaches are either O coaches or D coaches. That means that a kid gets so many more reps at one position on one side of the ball every practice with a coach dedicated to that position. Add those extra reps up through the course of a season, being coached by coaches concentrating on only one positon on one side of the ball, and by mid to late season, a sophomore may have got more coaching and more reps at his position, than a senior at another school that practiced on both sides of the ball during his career. That sophomore by late season is a very well coached player that executes extremely well. Take Seth Hope, a junior and number 82 who had a bunch of sacks in the state game, for example. Kid played a lot last year as a sophomore. Did a nice job. At the beginning of this year, he was a good defensive linemen. But as the year progressed, he got better and better. 2/3s into the year, he became a very, very good d linemen and by the end of the year and throughout the playoffs, he was a dominant force. He had always worked extremely hard, but I firmly believe it was all the extra reps and all of the extra coaching that caused him to improve so very much during the course of the year.

The system is THE reason why Highlands has become, over the last several years since Dale implemented the system, so much better than they were at the start of the season and so dominant come playoff time. Dale and Weinrich also run offenses and defenses that allows them to adapt their offenses and defenses to the talent available. Running out of the gun, when Highlands has small, quick O linemen, it's a steady diet of counters and traps. When the O line is bigger and not as mobile, it's can easily become a two back set with more straight forward power football. Got a QB with a great arm but not necessarily great running talent, then it's an air it out offense. Got a QB with a very good arm but great running skills, then it's a lot of QB draws, QB counters, with the RBs becoming blockers. A built in wildcat if you will. Weinrich does the same thing on defense. The basic look is the same, but it is easily adjusted to fit the players playing defense.

Finally, the players. For all the reasons stated above, Highlands players totally buy into the system. Perhaps it happens in some living rooms between players and their dads, but I've never heard any grumbling from a player or his dad that a player should be playing both ways or would be a "star" if he got to play both ways. I've read a post or two from fans saying this or that kid should be playing both ways, but within the team, I don't hear it. They bust their tails each and every offseason. When my kids played, it was standard protocol for the returning players not playing basketball to be in the weight room the day after the state game. It wasn't part of the official off season lifting/conditioning program that doesn't start until after the Christmas break, but it happened unofficially. I'm told such continues to this day. I know it's a sore subject with some, but kids at some programs work harder than others. Why folks don't think that's possible, when we all see people working harder than their co-workers, in every walk of life, is pretty amazing to me. I'm sure every program has some players that work as hard as any Highlands player, but at Highlands you see 90 plus percent of the players working their tail ends off at every weight lifting session, every conditioning session and every practice. Demanding and dedicated coaches, tradition, heritage and quite frankly intense competition for playing time because of all the players on the team (again caused by the things stated above) drives almost every player to work extremely hard.

Add all those things together and you get what Highlands has. I warned you that it was going to be a long answer.:biggrin:

Can't get any more transparent than that folks. So Simptitan, you and many others now have the bluebird recipe for success. Charlie22 is spot on correct!