Juggling the Hats of Many Men

High school student Kody Herndon gives a special look at the man Yukon High School calls coach and principal.

Thursday, July 28th 2011, 5:49 pm

By: News On 6

Originally Published: Oct 7, 2010 10:35 AM CDT

Kody Herndon
Student Mobile Journalist

At Yukon High School, head football coach Todd Wilson has recently added principal to his many titles with the school district.

Coach Wilson has previous administrative experience under his belt. He served in the role of principal six years ago for Yukon High School while being head football coach and athletic director. Two principals left at the end of 2009-2010 school year – one retired while the other took another administrative position within the district – so it only makes sense to put coach Wilson behind the desk again for his second time here at Yukon.

“I’m a little harder on the players because they know my expectations, and how I want them to represent their school,” Wilson said. “When they don’t do what’s expected of them it’s disappointing.”

Holding his players to high standards and instilling morals and discipline is his focus as a coach and mentor. Coach Wilson does enjoy being a principal because it allows him to interact with the student body more than just the kids in athletics.

Yukon is moving into a brand new school next year with a state-of-the-art sporting campus facility on it. Due to all the changes, juggling all his hats is not easy for Wilson.

“It’s definitely more work for me this year, but everyone at this school is doing more work this year,” Wilson said. “Preparing for the new school and having to deal with being staffed, so it’s definitely a little harder, but that’s life.”

The Millers are 4-1 for the season and earned a big win over rival Mustang.

“It feels great to have beat this football team,” Wilson said. “It doesn’t just feel great to me; it feels good to everyone in the Yukon community because it gives the town bragging rights for a whole year. It puts a lot of pressure on all the coaches and football players when that time of year rolls around because that game means so much to everyone and these kids don’t want to let anyone down, especially their selves and their teammates.”

Coach Wilson entered this season with the goal of a playoff appearance, and the Millers’ chances are looking good after a strong start. But Wilson is aware that Yukon’s district is deep and talented and knows his team cannot take any weeks off.

“We have a football team this year that really wants to make something happen, but our district is one of the tougher districts in the state,” Wilson said. “Unfortunately, we could be 7-3 in our district and still not make a playoff appearance; I would love to host a playoff game this year at our home field, because our community and kids would be able to take a part in it. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens throughout the rest of the season. We simply have to take it one Friday night at a time.”

Wilson now has 20 years of coaching experience under his belt, but he does not plan on going anywhere anytime soon.

“I love coaching here at Yukon, this is the longest I have stayed in one school and don’t plan on leaving anytime soon.”