Williamson determined to rebuild program
by Pete Cunningham
*As printed September 12, 2007 in The Homer Index  

It’s only week four of the 2007 football season and already Litchfield High School’s team could be classified as overachievers. A perennial doormat in the SCAA, The Terriers already had more wins after their second game than in each of their past three seasons. Behind the success is a man determined to change the culture of the Terrier football program. That man is coach Joe Williamson. “We’re not going to go into games, not expecting to win,” declared Williamson. “It doesn’t matter who we’re playing.”

There is a certain naiveté to the coach’s words. It’s almost as if he is in denial that the team of which he speaks suits up a handful of players one year removed from middle school competition. Such a mentality is necessary when taking over a losing program, similar to erecting a fallen nation from war-torn rubble.

In the wake of Litchfield’s 49-0 loss to Climax-Scotts, it’s clear that much of the work still lies ahead for Williamson and his young team. The coach shows no sign of backing down from that challenge. For a population - or in this case a football team - to rise against great adversity, the people/players behind the movement must believe in their leader. They must buy into his schemes or ideologies that stress forgetting the past and striving toward a new future.

Williamson’s role is not only that of a motivator and teacher, but of propagandist. Much like history’s most famous leaders, his task is to convince a group that has known nothing but failure that they can achieve greatness. He must convince them that all they’ve ever known is no more.

Williamson is no tyrant. From the looks of his players after wind-sprints on a 90-degree September afternoon however, some of his lineman might argue otherwise. The propaganda he distributes to his players comes in the form of workout regiments and speeches hinged on mental attitude. When Williamson was first hired in February, 65 players listened to him speak about commitment. Six months later, and only 24 remain on what the players and coach refer to as their family.

While 24 hours may fill a day and 24 karat gold might suggest a rich man’s blunder, 24 players on a football team is hardly that. The level of commitment Williamson demanded in the off-season was immense.

That 65 dwindled quickly. Many complained that in the past, “they weren’t required to workout in the summer.” Good riddance says Williamson.

“Well, in the past what have you done as a program? You’ve lost.” Williamson spares no words or feelings in his assessment of the ship he’s attempting to right, or the method with which it must be done. “If you want to change that, you’ve got to change your preparation and your attitude.”

The low numbers are not all Williamson’s doing, however. With dropping enrollment at Litchfield Community Schools this year, Williamson wasn’t even able to field a JV team, and there is little room for injuries in the already barren lineup.

“The things we can’t control I don’t even focus on,” states Williamson bluntly, and the issue is closed. 

Williamson is not afforded the luxury of a feeder program where his players can develop and grow against peers their own age and size, and he admits he is forced to do more teaching than he’d like as a result. The silver lining in this is that there will be less to unteach them in the years to come. 

For quarterback Mark Schneider and the nine other seniors on the team, the learning curve must be steep, as they strive toward their playoffs dreams. Schneider painfully recalled the spring workouts of the past where coaches would echo the same old “this is going to be the year” speeches.

Schneider says the difference this year isn’t the message or even the goals. He simply states, “They push us a lot harder.”

There is no magic or secret to Williamson’s method, just commitment and work ethic that Schneider and everyone around him have been required to adopt. In pushing them, he has taught them what it is to lead.