Student Teachers

WTW football stars learn about YMCA coaching on the fly

It was only days before their first game, and the fifth-grade flag football team consisting primarily of kids from Withers Elementary School didn’t have a coach for the Semones Family YMCA league.

With the team’s previous coaches having moved to another school, options were limited on short notice. A brainstorm between parents led to a unique solution.

Jimmy Joe Mowles, Andrew Paredez, Cooper Whitson, and Cooper Heller take the field every Friday night for W.T. White. And on Sunday afternoons, they return to patrol the sidelines for the Withers Bills.

“We remembered how much we loved playing flag for the Y as kids,” said Mowles, a senior receiver. “We couldn’t let the kids not play.”

Team mom Elisa Roby said the arrangement is mutually beneficial, giving the teenage volunteers an opportunity to gain experience as coaches, and giving their young proteges some talented mentors in their own neighborhood.

The four coaches are close friends and teammates for WTW in football and baseball. They’ve all been playing together since their own fifth-grade days at Withers.

“They thought we were celebrities over there,” said Heller, a senior lineman who attended a team function at the elementary school earlier this season.

Still, their team includes some kids who have never played football before. They only had a one-hour practice the night before the first game to find positions and run through some fundamentals.

Despite a 44-0 loss in that debut, the team has shown gradual improvement while the coaches have learned alongside them.

“It’s our first time coaching anybody,” Mowles said. “We work well with them, and we’re getting better every week.”

Mowles and Paredez, a junior quarterback, mostly coach the offense while Whitson, a senior linebacker, and Heller handle the defense.

“Watching the kids play has been fun,” Paredez said. “I think we’re trending toward a win.”

Plus, coaching provides a new perspective for the players, who are each key contributors for a Longhorns team that started 4-0 for the first time in decades and has legitimate postseason aspirations.

“It gives them a little better idea of where we’re coming from. They take pride in it, and look forward to it,” said WTW head coach Kenchee Ross. “They have a better understanding of the job we have to do.”