Youth football mid-season report

What is success for your youth team? We have tried to drill home the fact that if winning your league or going undefeated is your main goal, you may not be giving yourself enough credit.

There are so many more life lessons that come out of football, so many other positive experiences that need to be given to your players. Football is a great game, not only for your top players, but for your entire roster. It should be your mission to deliver this great opportunity and experience to your whole team.

At every level of football, self-evaluation is important.

On our varsity team we had lost our first game, so we needed to look at what we could do better to ensure that we didn’t lose to a team we felt that we could beat. We made some adjustments to try to meet our goal of a state championship.

At the varsity level, a state championship is the goal of most schools. But in order for that to be a realistic goal, you need a solid foundation at the younger levels. In that solid foundation, you need to create a culture of kids that just flat out love football. They also need to have a solid base of fundamentals that have been honed through their formative years. 

So how do we evaluate if we are doing what we need to at the half-way point of the youth season? Here is a checklist of what you need to do to keep on track of the process of developing players.

• Are players having fun? Football is a game and these kids are not going to continue playing if it is not fun. When something is fun, people will immerse themselves in it and become passionate about what they are doing. Try to continue to come up with drills that are continually challenging these players in new ways and coaching them with great attitude and positive reinforcement. Remember that to keep it fun doesn’t mean practice is a free-for-all. Rather, how you are delivering a message as a coach will determine the amount of fun your players have. 
• Are your players developing? Are you enhancing the development of your players? Can you tell that the individual skill set of each player is improving? Do not just focus on a group of players, coach them all up. Remember, a great sixth-grade player may or may not be a great player in high school. The same goes for a player who may have a few challenges at the youth level; he may be a beast when he grows into his body later on. We do not have a crystal ball to see into the future, so give all the kids your best effort every day.
• Are your players learning? Learning the game is different from developing skill. Learning is understanding why and how things work. I want our kids to be able to watch an NFL or college game and say, “Wow we run that play,”  or “That linebacker sure filled the hole on that one.” It is easy to line kids up, run a play and memorize an assignment. But we need to teach them why the play works. Help them understand that your play action pass freezes the linebacker and allows your receiver to get open on his route.
• Are they successful? By successful, I don’t mean that you are 4-0 at the half-way point. I mean are they able to execute the plays you want them to? Has your team developed the will to fight on every play? Most kids start off just going through the motions. Being successful is as simple as playing hard and giving their best effort on every play. In the long run, that will make them successful at everything they do.
• How many will play next year? As a high school coach who runs our youth program, the number one goal for every year in our youth football program is to have more players out than the year before. A youth coach’s job is not the general manager for the varsity team, assembling the best kids for the program or weeding out players that he thinks are not up to par. A youth coach must foster a culture at that make kids want to be part of something special. The more players you can turn over to your high school program, the better coach you are.

All of us coaches that are involved with youth football need to take a quick time out and answer these questions to ensure that we are staying on the right path as a guardian to our great game. If we can make sure that the players are having fun and learning the game, success will follow. Remember that success may not be able to be judged in the short term. Long term results are what we are looking for.  Give these kids all you can. If you make them feel a part of something special, tomorrow they will be part of something special.

          

Terry Donovan is a Master Trainer for USA Football’s Heads Up Football program. He is the offensive line coach for Kasson-Mantorville High School in Kasson MN. He is also a Youth coach and Director of Youth Development in the Kasson-Mantorville Youth Football Association.