[cougarpride08]

Keep in mind that CCH did win the state championship in 06, so it's not like they've been down for a long time.

As for the lower than CCH average quality of their teams the past two years, I think there are two main reasons: 1. coaching; and 2. talent.

Addressing coaching, I never felt that Brossart was as bad of a coach as he was made out to be by some CCH folks. I didn't think he was a great coach, just not as bad as he was portrayed. I don't think, as a non-CCH graduate, he fully understood all that surrounds coaching there. Heck, a lot of CCH folks were upset with, and grumbling about, Rodenberg and he was a good enough coach to win a state championship for them. Brossart soon after he got the job made some changes that alienated some big and long time supporters of the program. Then he went and became confrontational with one of the two folks that broadcasts their games over the internet. Not a smart thing to do to someone that gets the opportunity to point out the flaws to 1000s of people each game. If he had won a lot of games he could have overcome that problem, but when he did not, it only legitimized the critics, increased the volume of their complaining and created more critics. Playing the schedule that Rodenberg left him made the win loss record look bad. No help there.

Addressing talent, no one can in good faith argue that the talent level at CCH hasn't been down. And it's not just in football. Their basketball team has already been eliminated from the tourny and it will be the first year in quite some time that they won't be going to the region. I'm told they will have a strong baseball team, but we'll see. But at the end of the day, their senior and junior classes last year just weren't very strong. Heck, when the juniors were freshman, they got beat by Highlands something like 56-7 and if recall properly when the seniors were freshman they got handled also pretty badly by Highlands. Brossart unfortunately had to deal with the always controversial issue of playing juniors over seniors and some sophomores over juniors and seniors. I know for a fact that that caused a lot of parental problems. Perhaps because his "newness" at CCH he was unable to succesfully sell what Mueller has been good at selling: he will put the best players on the field at all times regardless of grade level and to do otherwise is unfair to all the kids working so hard to win state.

I don't know much about the new coach, Wirth, but I know that the sophomes and frosh the past year at CCH were pretty good and gave Highlands much better match ups. The senior class on the 09 team was of course the kids that got beat badly by Highlands when they were frosh. There doesn't seem to be a lot of talent in that class; whereas Highlands senior class for the 09 team is extremely talented and deep. But if the juniors and sophomores on this year's CCH team really step it up and if Wirth is as good of a coach as I hear he is, then CCH should return to respectability this year and I think will be very good in 2010. And I'm guessing that the football players at CCH have worked harder than kids have worked at CCH in a long, long time. There is a lot of pride at CCH and that pride has been bruised badly by the beatings from Highlands in 07 and 08. I'm sure that former head coach Ray (whom handled the off season conditioning program until Wirth was hired) and now Wirth have constantly been reminding them of those beatings. The kids know what a huge upset, perhaps comparable to the 97 Mud Bowl, it would be if they beat Highlands in 09. For Highlands sake, I hope their kids aren't resting this off season on their laurels and accolades and realize just how motivated CCH is to beat them in 09.

good post!