MHSA(Q&)A: Football Coaches Jim Ahern and Brad Weber
August 31, 2012
Pewamo-Westphalia football coach Brad Weber and Lansing Catholic's Jim Ahern had experienced plenty of success long before the end of last season.
But this month marked the first time either had returned to the sideline after a trip to the MHSAA Finals.
Their teams faced off on opening night at Holt Junior High, the Cougars' home field. Gone were Lansing Catholic's all-state quarterback-receiver tandem that helped the Cougars finish Division 5 runner-up last fall, as well as the large group of standout se
niors who guided the Pirates to the Division 7 Final.
But the coaches are back for more, and we caught up briefly with both after Lansing Catholic's 45-21 win. (Lansing Catholic fell to 1-1 this week with a loss at Saginaw Nouvel, while P-W improved to 1-1 with a win over Potterville.)
This has to be the most unfamiliar group you've had at Lansing Catholic?
Ahern: They're a good group from the standpoint that they have a lot of team chemistry. They're a close-knit group, and they've worked extremely hard in the offseason. I know every coach says that. But this, probably of all the groups I've had, has really worked hard. We were a little nervous. We had a lot of kids playing in spots where they hadn't been there, but they settled down a little bit.
Have the players approached things differently because of how you ended up last year?
Weber: A little bit. But it's still football, and they've been playing football since sixth grade. It shouldn't be too different.
Are you (as a coach) approaching some things differently?
Weber: Yes and no. We're still getting down to business. Practices are the same. We still have a lot of energy at practice. But you do. You're looking for a little bit of the senior leadership to step up because it was so good last year. These guys kinda took it for granted, and they rode on their coat tails, and it's time for them to step up and be leaders of this team. It's 2012 now.
Ahern: Not really. Every year I tell everyone the same thing. Our goal is to win the league. If we do that, good things will happen. That's our goal -- to win the conference. ... We're still running the same stuff pretty much. We haven't changed a whole lot.
Do you have to say things to certain guys who are replacing (all-staters), like 'Do you know what you're stepping into?'"
Ahern: You don't have to remind them about it. They know it. They don't need to hear it. I think that's why they work so hard in the offseason. The bar's set pretty high for them, so they want to continue that.
'Let Them Lead' Shows How Through Coach's Eyes During Huron Hockey's Rise
By
John Johnson
MHSAA Communications Director emeritus
September 17, 2021
Over 30 years of riding shotgun with Jack Roberts, I quickly learned to respond whenever I was asked about the lifetime values of high school sports, with a laundry list with these two items at the top:
Hard Work - Team Work
In reviewing the newly-released book by Ann Arbor’s own John U. Bacon – “Let Them Lead, Unexpected Lessons in Leadership From America’s Worst High School Hockey Team” – everything flows from those two values all of us in prep sports hold near and dear.
I met John in 1997 when he was a sportswriter at The Detroit News, where he was covering his high school alma mater – Ann Arbor Huron – in the Class AA Football Final at the Pontiac Silverdome. Just a few years later, the story that holds the detailed leadership lessons together in this book would begin when he was named the head hockey coach at Huron, inheriting a team that finished the previous season 0-22-3.
Building everything he put into that team with the premises that no one would outwork the River Rats, and as a team they supported each other, Bacon’s charges rose from not even being listed in the national team winning percentage listings - about 1,000 schools - prior to his arrival, to a top-five spot in the state’s rankings in his fourth year.
Along the way, the buy-in to the leadership themes made Huron Hockey cool again at the school and earned the River Rats the respect of their opponents. The values being taught gave value to the program. In making it hard to be a part of the team, more kids wanted to join it. They valued the experience. They led and supported themselves on and off the ice.
With the book being written nearly 20 years after the events it is based on, Bacon solicited input from a variety of players to verify the accuracy of events, and they flooded him with additional stories of their own from their playing days and adult lives which illustrated the leadership skills they learned in the locker room, training sessions, practices and games.
Like any book on leadership, you forge through those details about applying certain things in the workplace, but what keeps you engaged is the team. You’ve gotten hooked by the River Rats, and you just have to see how this thing turns out.
This feel-good tome resonates whether you’re a coach or a corporate type. It’s an easy read, and you'll take a lot from it.
John U. Bacon did play ice hockey for the River Rats, owning the distinction for playing the most games at the time he graduated – but also never scoring a goal. His writing, teaching and speaking career have produced seven books which have been national best sellers; he’s an established historian on a variety of topics – including the football program at University of Michigan, where he currently teaches; and he’s in demand as a public speaker.
Let Them Lead is published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and available through a variety of bookstores.
PHOTOS (Top) Huron's hockey team runs the Michigan Stadium stairs in 2002. (Middle) "Let Them Lead" tells the story of the program's transformation. (Below) The River Rats celebrate their Turkey Tournament championship in 2001. (Photos courtesy of John U Bacon.)