Maybe it's the rain and the low ceiling of clouds, but the WiFi signal is suddenly carrying to our campsite so I'll try to post this before it fails again. . . .
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There's a nice story in the Eagle Tribune down in Massachusetts under the headline Football alive again: Youth program gets resurgence in Andover that has a Dartmouth connection. (LINK)
Central to the story is former Dartmouth defensive back Jimmy Johnson '14, the coach of the town's 7th/8th grade football team who took Buddy Teevens' lessons to heart and has used them to help breathe life into the Andover youth football program. From the story:
“Our numbers were down between COVID, and (during that time there was a) lot more information (coming out) about concussions, especially at this age and how it impacts youth football players,” said Johnson. “A lot of kids and parents were being cautious about it and we understood that. We had to come up with new and creative ways to keep these players safer and we did.”
And . . .
“I played for Buddy Teevens and he was one of the first college coaches who implemented no tackling at practice,” explained Johnson. “We never tackled in practice but we did drills like we’re doing here in order to teach us proper form, proper tackling technique and different things. We were one of the better tackling teams in the league and our concussion rate went way, way down because of all of that so we implemented it here.
And . . .
“We have all different ways of teaching the kids how to tackle, especially at this age level of fifth and sixth grade. We have tackling tubes, we have them working on high knees and how to tackle different players in different scenarios. We have a ton of coaches including (former Andover High star quarterback and 2022 Eagle-Tribune offensive MVP) Scotty Brown who has come down to help, as well as current players on the high school team. We are doing a lot of different things to try to mitigate (the possibility of head injuries). It’s impossible to eliminate concussions, but it’s been far, far less (since we changed our practice philosophies).”
Green Alert Take: "Saving the game" was something Buddy Teevens always talked about. Now one of his former players is helping do just that.
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The Delaware State News has a story headlined, Delaware transfer Herring interested in more than just football that begins this way (LINK):
Tyron Herring’s mom established her son’s priorities when he was young.
Green Alert Take: While the story about Tyron Herring '23 is behind a paywall you can be pretty sure even without access to it that his Dartmouth and Ivy League background inspired the story. It's not the first and won't be the last such story as Big Green grad transfers make their mark.
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The Dartmouth has a story headlined, Q&A with Claire VeNard, newly appointed Dartmouth Athletics chief of staff; Claire VeNard reflects on how her past as an athlete and administrator at Notre Dame have prepared her for the role. (LINK)
The Q and the A that might be most important to Dartmouth fans:
In recent years, the majority of Dartmouth’s sports teams have had losing records. What strategies will you use to boost these records?
CV: That’s to be determined. I’m two weeks in at this point, and so I think my understanding is that there’s lots of potential at Dartmouth. I’m just really excited to get to know the people and to understand the strategies that are currently in place. Over time, it will be a work in progress to figure out how we can make an impact.
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EXTRA POINT
The Summer Of Storms has struck again. The rain that chased us off the lake yesterday afternoon is pounding on our VW bus again this morning and we're holed up waiting for it to slow before breaking camp. Even when it slows – if it does – there's going to be a lot of wet stuff getting packed up into the VW. That includes the two of us.
But wet or not, it was a final couple of days away .Starting tomorrow it's all Dartmouth football for the next three months. ;-)
