Think fast! Name a few legendary figures that have played for the Dallas Cowboys! Just as many as you can!
After quickly spitting out a few obvious names, such as Emmitt Smith, Troy Aikman, or Roger Staubach, you might soon stumble upon Tom Landry, arguably the best coach to ever head the team. Though his nomination fails to completely answer the original challenge- he’s far more famous for his work coaching the team, his invention of the 4-3 defensive scheme, which is still widely used today, than for his playing career- the idea that a coach, a man who, unlike the other unanimous Cowboys’ great, never tangibly impacted the outcome of a game since he never physically took the field with the team, would warrant this consideration underscores his importance to the franchise.
Famously donning a suit and tie to each of his team’s games, even those in the hundred-plus degree weather that often squelches the Dallas metroplex, Landry demanded respect from his players. But just what, aside from a clear dedication to his team, characterizes a good coach? To find out, I shadowed two of Jesuit’s own, Coach Brandon Hickman and Coach William Thompson, the head coach and defensive coordinator of your Rangers, respectively, to find out. My first stop? The team’s weekly practice.
Now picture this: a young nerdy boy clad in a pressed dress shirt and a crisp tie meekly strolls, iPad and camera clutched in hand, onto the football field, inhabited by a bunch of sturdy, uniformed football players drenched in sweat. Noticing a misfit yet? Though, in my observation of the team’s morning practice, my appearance might have clearly stood out, I actually felt completely unnoticed. Even when walking directly behind the mob of players lined on the side, I generated just a few quick curious glances; the team, apparently, was intently focused on a bigger goal.
Some claim that the best coaches are defined by their ability to extract the raw talent from their players and fuse this aggregate of talent into a crisp, well-functioning team, a team impermeable by the multitude of distractions which surely challenge it during the game. And while I might have been the most obvious misfit, I was far from the only; during my observation session, a number of others, ranging from other athletes who ran the perimeter of the field to a group of band members using the field as a liaison to their practice location, entered the field. Instead of succumbing to the distractions, the players, well conditioned for this hectic environment, synchronously shuffled on and off the field as their individual squads were called upon, a quick pace that allows the team to, says Coach Hickman, “maximize [its] reps.”
What most surprised me, though, was the frequency with which the coaches themselves broke the supposedly sacred boundaries of the sidelines to enter the
playing field; often positioned directly in the center, between the hashes of the gridiron, the placement of the coaches represented a stark contrast to their usual position during a game, strolling back and forth across the sidelines. If this failed to deter the attention of the team, I don’t know what would have.
The tone of the practice was far from militant; in the midst of breaks, players cordially joked with each other, broadly smiling as they quenched their thirsts at the water cooler. According to Kyle Shannon ’14, a member of the varsity team, practice “is casual, but it also has a sense of urgency. Coach always says that ‘the train is always moving forward.’ We have to go out there with the right mindset so that in the game we know we can do it right. But there’s also that effect that you’re with your friends, you’re joking around with each other; [at the same time], we need to get things done so that we can joke around and be successful.”
Shannon, like other varsity players, initially played for the freshmen team, progressing his way up the triangle, from the freshmen squad to junior varsity and finally to varsity. And even though Hickman only directly coaches the varsity team, Shannon played in his shadow throughout his entire football career. He speculates that the constant exposure to Hickman throughout his years helped construct a sense of unity and devotion. Though “as a freshman [he] wasn’t really thinking of playing varsity,” the initial process of familiarizing himself with the coach, “getting used to what he likes, what he dislikes, [and] doing what he asks” fostered a sense of respect. As a senior, he feels a responsibility to Hickman and to his teammates now that his performance correlates with Hickman’s success; “the attitude has been from we need to work hard to better his team to now I’m part of his team and I need to play for him.”
To attain this success, Coach Hickman specializes his practices to devote individualized attention to the players of each position and to cater the strategy to the team’s next opponent. “[Starting] practice with the national anthem,” he even practices seemingly minute details to expose his players to every possible situation that they “might see or would see on Friday night.” The national anthem, for one, is a guarantee.
Shannon emphasizes that even amidst these intra-team divisions- he plays on the defensive unit- the players maintain a feeling of unity of each other due to the inclusive activities also contained in practice: “We [first] do individual drills, where safeties and defensive lineman, [for instance], do their own thing. [Then], we come together as a team and talk about goals for the practice and go to the end zone to [communally] do stretches.”
After spending about half-an-hour at the morning practice, I was inside to begin another school day, seated in a desk where I was instructed by various teachers throughout the day. But as the final bell tolled at 3:41- still an odd time to me, even as a senior- I joined the team in a classroom again to observe the weekly video session, when the team visually reviews its previous performance and previews the schemes which its next opponent is likely to run. Again, Hickman specializes this video session to maximize efficiency, dividing the offensive and defensive squads into different rooms. Hickman works with the offense, while Coach Thompson, the defensive coordinator, instructs the defense. Watching film- much more involved for the players, by the way, than your typical movie- not only serves as an instructional tool, but a change of pace from what can inevitably be the monotony of practice. Though “[doing] the same thing everyday” can lead to boredom, observes Coach Hickman, the video provides a different perspective which helps to “keep the team engaged.”
I stepped in with Coach Thompson for a few minutes. What I observed was not simply a bunch of guys lounging around watching a mere projection onto the board, but an active dialogue among Thompson and his players, which you, the reader, can see firsthand by watching the clip attached. As Thompson highlighted several points of emphasis on the board in yellow, a number of players spoke out to offer their comments on the situation. Clearly, though the formality of the players, dressed in a tie as I was during their morning practice, contrasts the typical associations surrounding a football practice as a brute test of physical toughness, this was equally as beneficial for the team.
And then the time comes. The lights glaring down upon the players, the team trots out for its weekly game, for which it has prepared countless hours. Shannon, joking that balancing both academics and athletics at Jesuit often involves “little sleep,” highlights the “need to be diligent” in accomplishing assignments and homework: “You have to be on top of your [athletic] game at all times, but you also need to be on top of your school work because we all need to go to college. You have to find that medium ground and work towards that medium ground.”
Hickman, who refreshes with a bit of solitude, often “getting away for lunch, keeping to himself some,” and “[calling his] wife” before he jogs out into those
bright lights on Fridays, believes that his athletes juggle this balance of academics and athletics well. He notes the frequency with which his players “take advantage of the study hall doing their homework, studying, or going to see a teacher.” According to him, his team simultaneously develops important life skills since “learning how to balance both is part of growing up.”
So just what makes a good coach? What exactly alikens a coach to the revered Tom Landry? In a notoriously football-centric state, I think it’s most important that a coach considers not what his players can do for him, but what he can do and how he can be present for his players. Most of his guys- Jake Oliver ’13, wide-receiver for the Texas Longhorns, and Jordan Mastrogiovanni ’13, linebacker for the Texas A&M Aggies, clearly excluded- will end their football career upon playing their final game in a Jesuit uniform, much less playing in the pros. What I observed in my foray into the team’s practices, more than anything, was a harmonious unit that balanced both the innate drive to win and the innate need of its players for security and support. Coaching is “getting the best out of people,” says Landry. These Rangers achieve a silver star in that regard.
