In my last post, I wrote about things I would do to rebuild a high school program. One of the items on my list was that you need to be patient, and need the patience of the school administration. Too often you are expected in 3 years to have it turned around. I have a perfect example for everyone of how patience can pay off for your program.
This last weekend Aloha High School won the Oregon 6A state title for the first time in history. What makes this run even more significant is that for 20 years the program had been the doormat of the state. I remember my playing days and no matter what, you knew that you could beat Aloha in football. That all changed 7 years ago with the hiring of their current coach.
When Coach Chris Casey arrived at the school, people were ashamed to be from Aloha. Here is the story about what he encountered when he arrived.
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This last weekend Aloha High School won the Oregon 6A state title for the first time in history. What makes this run even more significant is that for 20 years the program had been the doormat of the state. I remember my playing days and no matter what, you knew that you could beat Aloha in football. That all changed 7 years ago with the hiring of their current coach.
When Coach Chris Casey arrived at the school, people were ashamed to be from Aloha. Here is the story about what he encountered when he arrived.
A generation ago, Aloha was an attractive, close-to-downtown suburb offering new homes with large lots, proximity to good-paying jobs and a successful high school football program.
In the years since, things have become tougher. Wages have stagnated over time. Scores of businesses have closed in the past 12 months. And the Warriors football team withered, with winless seasons (four) outnumbering above-.500 finishes (one) in one 18-year period.
Under seventh-year head coach Chris Casey, though, the football team has gradually revived. Last year, the team achieved a winning record for the first time since 1989. This year, the Warriors won the championship of the uber-competitive Metro League for the first time since 1984, and beginning with tonight's first-round playoff game against visiting Barlow of Gresham, the Warriors are expected to make a serious run at a state championship -- and take a riveted community along for the ride.
"There are a lot of people barely hanging on," said Steve Cutone, owner of Buddies Sports Bar & Grill, less than a mile south of campus. "With the football program over at Aloha doing well, it kind of takes the thought of, 'Geez, we're not doing so well,' and you think, 'Hey, these guys are doing great.........'"
Casey, brother of Oregon State baseball coach Pat Casey, remembers his first meeting with the Beaverton School District superintendent, when he heard all about how the school was down on its luck, overshadowed by its more affluent neighbors in the district.
"I took it as a challenge," said Casey, the father of four children, ages 9 to 19. "When I got here, people were depressed and apologetic about being from Aloha. It's like people were acting like losers."
In the three seasons before Casey arrived at Aloha, the team lost 25 of 27 games and drew small, disinterested crowds to home games.
"The stigma on the kids was, 'Well, you go to Aloha, that's the loser school,'" said Mark Girard, a 1973 graduate who has lived in Aloha his entire life and attended games every year. "This means so much to me, and the people I know that played there, that they're erasing that stigma."
When the Warriors played host to perennial powerhouse Jesuit on Oct. 15 with first place in the Metro at stake, the stands were full one hour before kickoff. A crowd estimated at more than 5,000 watched Aloha win 38-25 to end a 24-game losing streak to the Crusaders.
"That win, that night, was by far the biggest thing I've ever witnessed at our high school, and at any high school, in my life," said Ed Macsisak, a former youth football coach who now serves as director of football operations for the high school.
As the Warriors finished their warm-ups and prepared to return to the locker room about 30 minutes before the game, Casey had them take a knee on the field.
"I told them to look around at what they had created," Casey said.
"It's a big buzz around the town, wherever you go," said Cutone, who put a "Go Warriors!" message on his sports bar's readerboard a few weeks ago. "The news is damn depressing, so you take something like Aloha football, a real positive like that, and it lifts everybody's spirits."
Starts with youth Aloha's decline on the football field coincided with changing times for the surrounding community.
New high schools opened in the Beaverton School District, redefining Aloha's enrollment boundaries. The median income of the community, in inflation-adjusted dollars, has been stagnant since 1980. In the 2009-10 school year, Aloha had a free or reduced lunch rate of 40 percent -- highest in the Beaverton district by a third.
A Washington County-issued newsletter says 100 businesses are expected to close in the next year on top of the 103 that folded in the past year.
The Aloha football turnaround began in 2000 when Oscar Cardona, a Nike executive and father of senior running back Troy Cardona, took over as president of Aloha Youth Football. Cardona didn't rubber-stamp waiver requests for players to join nearby youth programs.
"They wanted to go to Beaverton or Southridge or Westview," Cardona said. "I said, 'Let's try to be proud of our community. Help me solve the problem. I'm not going to let you run away from it.' I was threatened with lawsuits."
The youth program began to build, and in 2004, the high school program got the motivational leader it needed in Casey.
A college assistant for 19 seasons at Linfield (1985-93) and Whitworth (1994-2003) in Spokane, Casey and his wife, Kathleen, looked to move back to the Willamette Valley to be closer to family. Aloha needed a coach, and the school's athletic director, Kevin Bryant, was the same athletic director who hired Casey at Whitworth.
The year Casey was hired, the program got another shot in the arm when Nike, the Tualatin Hills Park and Recreation District and the U.S. Soccer Federation joined forces for a $1 million project to install artificial turf on Aloha's football field.
It was just the beginning. Nike helped make new football uniforms affordable. Jim Reimann, a businessman whose son played for Casey at Linfield, started giving $6,500 each year for the high school team to attend a summer football camp at Gold Beach. Rick Miller, an Aloha parent, gave $237,000 for a new weight room.
The school got a boost when the school district spent $15.7 million to build a science wing.
Changing the culture
Meanwhile, Casey was at work instilling a work ethic in the football program. The team began to win more and made breakthroughs last year with the winning record and long-sought playoff spot.
"There's about four kids that played Westview youth football that are now in the Aloha program because of what they've done over there," Westview High School coach Greg Fisher said. "I guess that's kudos to Chris. He's built a belief in a program, and kids want to play for that."
With their good-guy coach, lunch-pail image and underdog back story, the Warriors have become sentimental favorites. Casey said two Metro coaches have told him their wives pull for the Warriors.
Around Aloha, the Warriors have become celebrities of sorts. More than 300 people jammed into the Peppermill Restaurant for a party after the Jesuit game, cheering players and coaches as they arrived.
"I don't think the kids there fully realize it," said Girard, the 1973 Aloha graduate, "but I run into classmates and people that graduated before me, and they're just ecstatic about this. And they're coming out and they're going to games again. And they're saying, 'You can hold your head up and say you went to Aloha High now.'"
This is what makes high school football so great, as it can raise the spirits of an entire community. Look at the patience exhibited by the coach and administration to give him time to build this program. Imagine if he had been canned after 3 or 4 years? Would they have their state title? Coach Casey would be a great coach to talk to about rebuilding a high school program. He stuck to his beliefs and helped turn not only a program around but also a community.
