Southern Boone County head football coach Trent Tracy is entering his fifth year with a team that has consistently improved over the last few years of his tenure. A 4-7 season as a rookie head coach progressed into a program ranked sixth in the state after two weeks of play in the 2017 season.

“There’s always a period of change and it takes time to get people in the right positions and get people committed to the weight room and committed to the program,” Tracy said.

Getting people in the right positions has worked for Tracy in this offseason, bringing in three new hires at assistant coaching positions. Two, in Teneil Stevenson and Steve Hopkins, bring their skills from schools on the Eagles schedule.

Stevenson was the former defensive coordinator at Fulton and will be coaching the wide receivers on Tracy’s staff.

Hopkins was an assistant at Boonville under head coach Barry Blank. Boonville, who is joining the Tri-County Conference in 2018, finished with their best record in five years in 2017 and had five players named to the All-District team. He will be coaching the defensive line for Tracy.

Austin Schaar was also added as the quarterbacks coach.

“Anytime you bring in new guys, you get new, fresh ideas. Things that they’ve seen at programs they’ve been at that has worked and hasn’t worked and as coaches, it’s kind of an open mic night when we have our meetings. We don’t want coaches to be quiet and not have ideas. We want them to bring forward ideas and things they might see… If you stay the same every year are you getting any better?” Tracy said.

~ There’s more to the story in today’s Journal ~

By Briley Eilers