The kids report today and although it is fire drill to get things ready for around 140 players it is nice to be forced to morph into a football coach. Over the last two weeks my staff multi-tasks and marking laundry loops, chasing down undelivered equipment, and painting lines on three practice fields provides us all with what I refer to as Division III moments. It humbles you at times, but the players returning and the energy they will hopefully bring get to turn us into college football coaches again. With school being pushed back, we will get unfettered access to prepare our team over the next three weeks. Done right, it can give us an advantage going into the September 3rd game with Saint Vincent. Tim Leister does a great job on the video updates through camp, use the website or our Football Facebook page to stay in the loop.
In January of 1995 I remember standing at the Exxon Station in downtown Lexington talking to Gary Fallon who had just finished his 17th year at Washington and Lee University. I was out of work and asked him at the time his opinion of a career shift to Division III that was my only option to stay in college football. Gary who played at Syracuse and coached both there and at Cornell prior to coming to Lexington told me, “Mike, do not think at times it will not be humbling. You will wonder why other people you know in coaching are making the big money. You will ask why they are on TV and getting asked to speak at all of the clinics, be prepared at times it will be hard.” I had all of those feelings particularly in my early years and occasionally now on a day where the collateral duty overwhelms us. But Gary added, “But Mike I have been my own boss for 17 years, I raised three daughters in a great community and I’ve coached and influenced some great kids who come back and are now my friends. I can’t say I would have said it earlier, but I am 55 now, and I look back and say I didn’t miss a thing.” I took the job at BC and about a month later Gary Fallon died of a heart attack in his sleep.
I turned 55 this summer and year 17 starts today at Bridgewater Football for me. Although I plan on staying healthy, I could go tomorrow and not have been cheated in this life. I believe Gary Fallon that day was a plant by God for me to hear. I have told his wife that on several occasions. In some sense I have morphed into Gary Fallon: Shared his experience 55 miles up I-81, and like Gary if asked I could honestly answer now, “That I have not missed a thing.” Go Eagles. MClark
