When you are taking a program to new heights you must feel like you are climbing a mountain and sometimes when you reach that summit you tend to relax. And that is the wrong thing to do.
Last season, Mansfield Senior produced perhaps the best football season in the history of the school. They were 10-0 in the regular season and were hardly challenged in running through and passing over the tough Ohio Cardinal Conference. It was the first ten win season in the history of the program. They went on to win a first round playoff game, shutting out Licking Heights. Their season came to end with a four point loss in the second round to New Albany.
Now the underlying question is was that season an anomaly or was it just the beginning of a consistent period of success for the Tygers? That question will be answered this season or at least begin to be answered.
Football teams that have solid programs and not just super seasons don’t have huge dips in their performance. For example, programs in North Central Ohio such as Ashland, Norwalk St. Paul, Tiffin Columbian, or Wynford have seasons when they have great talent and they win 10 or more, but when they don’t have that same talent level they are somehow still able to win seven, eight or even nine games. That consistency is hard to achieve and it is born not just at the varsity level, but also the junior varsity, freshmen and even junior high programs.
Kids that grow up in those programs expect to win and they know what it takes to reach that level. An important and sometimes lost component in this is the role of the parent or caregiver. They have to be on the same page and understand that success of the whole program should be held above the perceived success of their son. If your kid isn’t the star player, but a key contributor, that’s okay.
Since Chioke Bradley, a Mansfield Senior alum, became the coach at Mansfield Senior I have heard the phrase “a change in the culture” when it comes to the Mansfield Senior football program. The number of players has increased and, of course, so have the wins.
However, this summer the Tygers lost 19 players to graduation and it will be interesting to see if the program can maintain a level of excellence. It is easier for players to be excited about football when they are winning all of the time. With a younger and less experienced team, it’s unlikely the team will go unbeaten this season and it will be interesting to see how the players respond to adversity.
If Mansfield Senior has truly turned the corner with its football program then they need to win seven or eight games this season. Ashland may not win the Ohio Cardinal Conference (OCC) football title this season, but I can almost guarantee you that the Arrows will win at least seven games this fall. I know this because they always have since Scott Valentine took over the program.
The mark of a solid program is not winning when you have the best talent week in and week out it is still winning when that isn’t always the case.
So, the true test for Mansfield Senior was not last year, or the year before, but this year. We will start getting answers in a couple of weeks.
After years of toil and sweat behind radio station microphones, longtime broadcaster, Jeff Swank joined the new generation of sports followers on the web.
Swank launched his internet radio station with nothing more than some wire, a box with some knobs and switches, and an itch to do much more than just scratch the surface of everything sports.
Richland Source is proud to introduce Jeff as a writer focused on high school sports. He will contribute a weekly column and analysis of a featured game of the week from one of our area high schools.
In addition to his work at Richland Source, Jeff provides complete high school sports coverage for over 70 Ohio schools at his web site, http://www.swankonsports.net76.net/.
