RIDGEFIELD — To listen to the Ridgefield Spudders tell their story, it is almost as if they felt they had to endure the 2009 football season in order to enjoy 2010.
They had to go through the pain of the 1-8 campaign, they had to get a feel for their new coach, Kitt Rawlings.
Now, it’s happening, a big-time change for Ridgefield football.
The Spudders are 3-0, including 1-0 in the Trico League as they prepare to take on rival La Center tonight. These Spudders dream of a league title, of a playoff berth. But no matter what happens the rest of 2010, they believe in themselves.
That makes it a successful season already.
“Of course we were frustrated with our record (last year), but we knew we were headed in the right direction with Coach,” senior running back Dylan Young said. “The amount of time he put in for us, and the amount of time we put in for him … we knew we were starting to do things the right way.”
It was a transformation that really did start during that tough 2009 season. The Spudders were close in a lot of games. The players would talk up the program to the classmates. Despite the losses, the atmosphere at practice was all positive. From the coaches to the players, positive.
Last year, the program ended the season with 47 players. Today, there are 72 Spudders — program wide — on the football field.
Many of them went to work early.
Rawlings credited an offseason workout program designed by Bill Victor of A Higher Bound Fitness and Performance Training. Rawlings said the first building block of any football team is a good speed, strength, and agility program.
His Spudders must have agreed.
Young, who has rushed for 503 yards and five touchdowns in the first three games, credits the offseason program with the turnaround in the win-loss record. But there is never just one key thing in such a story.
Fullback Juan Valencia, who has 199 yards and two touchdowns this season, said there is a big difference from last year to this year in the mental approach to the games.
“I’d have to say it’s about confidence and leadership,” said Valencia, who also plays middle linebacker. “To get people to believe.”
And then there has to be the leaders who keep the rest of the players accountable. James Oman, a senior tight end and defensive lineman, said the team unity is strong this year, strong enough to allow for some of the older players to get after the younger ones.
“If guys are screwing around, the captains meet, and we tell people to pull up their sleeves and get back to work,” Oman said. “It’s a business atmosphere. We have some fun, too, but it’s business.”
Clay Barton and Andrew Mulligan join Young, Valencia, and Oman as the team’s captains. They try to follow their coach’s lead.
Rawlings said anything negative that happens on the field, either in practice or in games, is an opportunity to turn it into a positive.
If that philosophy turns into a winning streak, or a possible winning record, that’s all the better for the Spudders.
Every day at practice, assistant coach Troy Couch carries with him the “hammer.” Players are picked, and get their names on the hammer for things such as the hardest hit of the week. Or the most aggressive. Or the most respectful.
The players, the captains say, respond to the motivational device.
Already, there is a buzz on campus. Valencia said there are more fans in the stands.
“In the past, I always felt like the fans didn’t want to see us,” he said. “It’s more fun for us now, knowing our fans are screaming and shouting and pumping us up.”
It’s a change that began last year, a positive change that all associated with Ridgefield football are experiencing this year.
