Media Day: Chisholm Longhorns

At Chisholm, Joey Reinart is a life coach first and a football coach second.

Thursday, July 28th 2011, 5:43 pm

By: News On 6

Originally Published: Aug 22, 2010 2:54 PM CDT

Dave Carty
Oklahoma Sports Staff Writer

OKLAHOMA CITY -- The Chisholm High School football program had some bumps along the way in 2009, ending with a 3-7 record.

But character is the focus of head coach Joey Reinart’s efforts.

“We’re out here to make our kids better students, and citizens and better people and stronger men,” he said at CoachesAid.com and Oklahoma Sports First Look Media Day. “When you start to achieve some of those goals, then you notice you start winning some football games.”

Of course, it helps in passing along a certain philosophy if the head coach himself could be mistaken for a high school student. Reinart has youth on his side and that helps his players relate to his message.

“It’s easier to get them to trust you right off the bat,” he said. “It’s not the old school mentality per se.”

Whatever mentality he takes into the new season, he’ll have his hands full bringing along a cast that lost 9 seniors from a year ago.

“What we’re looking at this year is a lot of young guys starting to step into those roles that those guys had before,” the coach said. “We got to throw them in there and get some experience out of them. [We’ll] try to move them along as best we can.”

He returns a line with one three-year starter and a slew of inexperienced, but big players. While you can’t teach speed, the coaching staff hopes some schooling on the field will bring them along sooner than later.

“Everything always starts up front,” said Reinart. “They’re big and they’ve got a little potential but we just got to keep working and getting those guys better.”

Derek Burnett, Bret Gillespy and Mike Coleman return at skill positions and Jon Ward added 39 tackles a season ago. Anybody who had experience a year ago for Chisholm is sure to see even more this year.