RYAN S. CLARK Published 12:00 am, Monday, December 21, 2009
SUPER GOLD TEAM
Tuesday is the first of three Super Gold Football Team installments. The Super Gold defensive player of the year and first- and second-team defensive units will be revealed Wednesday. The top offensive player and team will be released Thursday.
Brandon Faircloth’s first season as the head football coach of the Port Neches-Groves football team started well before he was hired in February.
Prior to picking up a clipboard, he witnessed winning first hand as he played defensive back and receiver at Brownwood, a school that has made 36 playoff appearances and has won seven of the eight state title games it has appeared in.
But he also played baseball and it was his talent as an outfielder that got him a scholarship to play at Sam Houston State. When he entered college, Faircloth was a pre-law major until a trip home made him change his mind.
“A guy was speaking at our church about coaching and he was talking about his experiences and that appealed to me,” Faircloth said. “I felt that it would be a good fit for me because coaching high school football was the kind of profession you cannot beat.”
Related Stories
Odessa Permian coordinator Faircloth set to become PN-G football coach
The inspiration Faircloth received to become a coach is the same inspiration he used to transform the PN-G football team from 3-6 a season ago to an undefeated regular season in his first year as a head coach.
That’s why the 32-year-old was named The Enterprise’s 2009 Super Gold Coach of the Year.
Good experiences
When Faircloth graduated college in 2000, he sent out his resume to 75 high schools hoping that one of them would give him a chance.
The program that gave Faircloth his first crack at coaching was Austin Westlake, another school quite familiar with winning as it has made 21 straight playoff appearances.
“I was very blessed that Westlake had a math teacher/coaching position opening,” Faircloth said. “They were able to play in two state title games while I was there so it was a good experience.”
Two years later he left Westlake for Highland Park, which if based on playoff appearances is the most successful program in state history as its made 51 playoff appearances. For the three years Faircloth was there, the school won a state title in 2005.
Then after a successful three-year stint as Odessa Permian’s offensive coordinator, it became apparent that it was the right time for Faircloth to run his own program.
Before he applied for the PN-G job, Faircloth already knew who he wanted to come with him as he started recruiting for his coaching staff as early as 1997.
At the time, he was a college student that worked at a Christian sports summer camp in Branson, Mo. There, Faircloth met Joe Dale Cary, his future assistant coach who helped Faircloth go 10-0 in his first season at PN-G.
“We were both camp counselors who were college students,” Cary said. “He was at Sam Houston State and I was at Texas A&M.
We both wanted to be coaches and we said that when one of us gets a head coaching job, the other guy will come work for him.
We talked about it, then it happened.”
Revamping The Reservation
When Faircloth was hired by PN-G, he was charged with the task of returning one of the state’s most majestic programs back to its glory days. That required Faircloth to revamp the staff by bringing in six assistants on the team’s nine-man coaching staff.
But bringing in six assistants was not that easy.
Some of those assistants, such as Cary, were at successful programs like Aledo, which defeated Brenham last weekend for the Class 4A Division II state title.
Still, Faircloth managed to convince his future staff to come to PN-G but it meant that they would be away from their families for months at a time.
“It was almost like for those few months, it felt like we were in college,” Cary recalled. “We were bachelors and had nothing to do but football. It allowed us to come in and get to know each other really well. For me, leaving my family was hard and its something I never want to do again.”
Emily Faircloth said it was tough to see her husband gone for six months, but she knew that this was an opportunity that her husband had to take advantage of.
“Even before they called him to offer the job, he asked me if this was something I wanted to do and I told him I appreciated him asking but we both knew what the other one was thinking,” she said. “It was a decision we made together and it was God’s design for this to happen.”
Gaining Trust
Faircloth said after he brought in the coaches he wanted it was about getting the kids to believe into his coaching philosophies.
He said that after the first day of spring practice, he could start to see that his players were buying into what he and his staff were preaching when it came to winning and discipline.
“We were able to build that trust factor pretty quickly,” Faircloth said. “We pushed them hard and that resulted in us having a great off season. When they came back in April they had some renewed energy having put on the pads for the first time after the kind of season they had last year.”
But to hear Faircloth tell it, he chooses not to take all the credit.
The only credit that he’ll give himself was that he was smart enough to hire assistants such as Cary and defensive coordinator Duane Kroeker.
Faircloth said that although his name is the one most people look at, its his assistants that make the program run.
But Faircloth and his staff have all worked in laying the foundation for what is expected to be another successful year for PN-G, which has 11 starters returning. PN-G will also be moving up players from its junior varsity team, which is also coming off an undefeated season.
Not too bad for a guy who thought about being a lawyer.
“When I was younger I thought I could argue with the best of them,” Faircloth said about why he thought about becoming a lawyer. “But there was something about athletics and watching kids succeed that appealed to me. I’ve just loved working with young people and helping them go after the goals they want in a season.”
