one of our top players is a senior Braden Wright um he's been with us for a few years now he used to play soccer and he came over and this kid I'm really excited for him he's been sacrificing a lot um real football sorry soccer folks became his favorite sport and this boy has been in a weit room and I am like so excited for him also you know I've gotten to spend a lot of time with him getting a few coffees talking Jesus in the morning before I go to work a few times so it's been amazing another player that I'm excited about is Elijah Applegate this was one of our players that I met uh when I was working over at a gym and I met him before I started coaching and so when I came to the team and he played my position uh at corner I was super excited to coach him so I'm excited for him as a senior and then Damen vessel he's one of our power like big dogs he's a defensive lineman and an offensive lineman I can put him anywhere he's fast he can move and he's looking to play at the next level so I'm super excited to kind of see what he can do this season so we can try to get him to that next level you guys are coming off of a great run you guys were the runner UPS in division 2 uh can you kind of tell me what that experience was like and how many of those guys are returning from last season so we had quite a few seniors and we had quite a few leave and then we had some guys not come back but um we're sitting right now with about four seniors we got about three to four Juniors and then the rest of the team the sophomores and one thing you know when you have a young team you try got to get that camaraderie get them more confident and you know basically buying in to do basically play football to charge his way and um I think we've been doing a good job of that because we have Junior High our JV Squad and then our Varsity kind of doing similar things now so now they can come up and kind of already know what they're supposed to do at that next level so we don't have to retach and retach all the time so that's a big benefit to have that JV program as well yep and then you guys started off this season with the homeschool classic you're out at 18t Stadium can you tell me and just relive that entire experience honestly it was really amazing um you know anytime you travel like that much throughout a season and it's all volunteer as well you know you're spending a lot of your time and money but we do it cuz we love it and just to see the look on the guys faces and the excitement that they had to be able to come out in that stadium and out of those tunnels you know where the professional players play it was so amazing I would do it 100 times over again for these boys did you guys get to do anything leading up to that game you know tour the field uh just go around Dallas what did you guys get to do while you're out there so actually you know everybody kind of went and did what they did but the one big thing we had that was awesome for the kids is a serve day and basically uh it was for the kids who were a little less fortunate or what you would say handicap um and they got to go out there and run drills with them and it was like one guy from our team one guy from their team coaches out there so it was amazing and it was a great experience for the kids and especially the kids down there in Dallas what do you feel like your players took away most from that experience you know honestly just just being under like a big stage but still trying to control their emotions and everything and being able to perform but usually when you you know when that kickoff hits you forget about everything you forget about the music you were playing in your headphones you know you say your prayer before the game you get with your teammates and get hyped but once that is kicked and that whistle blows it's all just you know noise from there it's like it's not even there and then your first game here in Missour is coming up against theer how are you guys prepping what are you anticipating out of that game well one thing's for sure theer is a really good tough team and they've have a deep history and I'm really actually excited to play a team like this because we really really can see what we got we only got about two weeks of practice before that first game because they moved our schedule up a week uh so was a little bit less prep time a few more mistakes that you know you expect for a first game anyway but outside of that I'm looking forward to preparing for the because we've had a lot of time to look at film and see what they do and the thing about theory is they're going to show you every single thing you're going to do you just got to be able to stop them and they're tough guys so I'm looking forward to see my guys face some adversity and see if they can turn it around tomorrow night so your first year as head coach for Lighthouse Christian what are you looking forward to most honestly for me I'm just looking to improve on some of the things I do one of the things I tell the boys is thank you for their efforts and you know usually when you somebody tells you thank you I look at it as like Nick sa would say there's an IOU attached to it and so if they give me the effort then I owe them my best to be able to prepare them for this game so I'm kind of excited to see how the boys execute everything and how well I can basically coach them through it and face that adversity with them and try to keep them up in spirit as the game goes on no matter what happens oh