Mike is sitting there upset that we didn't score." The following browsers are supported: Chrome, Edge (v80 and later), Firefox and Safari. I cant even put into words what he meant to me in developing as a player. He said, with the exception of one fake punt, Hodges never ran a trick play no double passes, no flea flickers or reverses. The top four receivers on the team were the four leading pass receivers in Texas Tech's league, the formidable Big 12. For him, the game combines the appeal of chess with the joy of a demolition derby. Hes already been around 23 years before he got to Hermiston. Senior wide receiver Carson Morter, who had never played tackle football until his junior year, said Hodges concepts were complicated, but they worked. A former small college football player and college assistant, Samuels now serves as the head coach at Comstock Park HS (MI). But he didn't look happy; he looked distracted, for all the world as if he would rather be left alone. Keep your business strong with local news. Facebook gives people the power to. Tyreque Jones, Safety, Boise State Like Hodges-Tomlinson, Jones was on the Falcons-led East team at the Shrine Bowl and dubbed the coaching staff "outstanding." It's not that they don't like him. (None of the S.M.U. He's yelling: HIT HIM! Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd, Last year's game against Texas Christian University was even odder: T.C.U., heavily favored, had shut out Southern Methodist University the week before, 44-0. MacPherson, 86, coached at UMass from 1971-1977. Notifications from this discussion will be disabled. }, Former UMass football coach Dick MacPherson has died. defenders hit him.) If you ask questions, it just goes on longer.". The third result is Mike Hodges age 60s in Washington, NC. He regards receivers as raffle tickets: the more of them you have, the more likely one will hit big. He touched a lot of people. This year's inductees are Dabby Dawson (Football, 1988-89), Chad Lavin (Women's Basketball Coach, 1986-98), Larry Nance, Jr. (Men's Basketball, 2012-15), Aubrey Vandiver (Women's Basketball, 2007-11), the 1968-69 Western Athletic Conference Champion Men's Basketball Team, and the back-to-back Western Athletic Conference Champion wrestling teams of 1984-85 and 1985-86. They found the offseason programming thatll work. var tag_id = document.getElementById('buylinkUMassFootball-hg-080917,ph04'); COURTESY UMass ATHLETICS Get the latest news, stats, videos, highlights and more about linebacker Michael Hodges on ESPN. https://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/04/magazine/coach-leach-goes-deep-very-deep.html. Michael is related to Joseph Stephen Hodges and Susan Hodgef as well as 2 additional people. He won his third state title in 1988, again going 15-0. Don't knowingly lie about anyone Symons and Sonny . Tre'Vius Hodges-Tomlinson talks to Kimmi Chex about uncle LaDainian's impact on him TCU Horned Frogs defensive back Tre'Vius Hodges-Tomlinson discusses how his uncle, Hall of Fame running back. Leach made his way to the sideline and from his back pocket pulled a crumpled piece of paper with the notations for dozens of plays typed on it, along with a red pen. Kay knew Hodges and the type of football coach he was. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. The offensive linemen positioned themselves between three and six feet apart -- on extreme occasions, the five linemen stretched a good 15 yards across the field. On offense, Texas Tech's numbers leapt out as positively freakish: a midlevel school, playing against the toughest football schools in the country, with the nation's highest scoring offense. Coming out of high school, most of them had only one or two offers from midrange schools. 7:55 pm. One day he announced to his wife, Sharon -- soon to be pregnant with their second child -- that what he really wanted to be was a college football coach. Hall has coached at Wagner, Hofstra, Fordham and Central Connecticut. Like all of his siblings, he was a three-sport athlete at Central. Every coach brings something different, Thompson said. Leach isn't really sure that there's anything a coach can say to football players minutes before a game that will inspire them to put aside their pain and their problems and play their best. 6:40 pm. var tag_id = document.getElementById('buylinkUMassFootball-hg-080917,ph01'); var photocredit = "'AP' 'Former UMass, Syracuse and New England Patriots football coach Dick MacPherson has died. Hodges looked down and read what to anyone but a football player is incomprehensible: Ace Rip 6 Y Shallow. A recent doctors visit effectively forced him into retirement. 's fear of the open spaces down the field had left the space right in front of Hodges empty. Share with Us. When he was an assistant coach at Colby, its staff annually visited Amherst to take in a UMass practice and talk football.. Following in his Father's footsteps, he graduated from the University of Florida in 1975 with a B.A. //var LBtag_id = document.getElementById('buylinkLBUMassMacPherson-hg-080917,ph05'); Assistant Head Coach, Offensive Coordinator & Tight Ends Coach. Select this result to view Michael Donald Hodges's phone number, address, and more. ", "Thinking man's football" is a bit like "classy stripper": if the adjective modifies the noun too energetically, it undermines the nature of the thing. football season, and with a throwing arm so dead that he required a cortisone shot to move it, Hodges was the nation's leader in yards passed, total offense and touchdowns. Lamb asked Hodges to visit him in Commerce and discuss taking a job teaching science, and trying his hand in coaching, while taking a break from college before entering dental school. or Texas or Alabama or, God forbid, Notre Dame. Hodges had an illustrious playing career for the Warren County Blue Devils from 1963-66 and was a part of state championships in 1965 and 1966, as well as a state runner-up team in 1964. This spring, Hodges told track and field coach Emily Strot he wasnt riding buses anymore, his hips couldnt handle it. Leach placed his hand on the small of his back and said: "You and me, Hicks. 5-yard line, where Leach called a pass play. "After 33 years you can probably guess UMass is pretty important to me,'' Hodges said. Hodges was co-defensive coordinator at Eastern Illinois, Before joining the Saints, Hodges rose in the ranks to earn a top spot at Sean. "I could hear Bennett screaming," Cumbie says, referring to the S.M.U. But speeding everything up has a curious effect on game time. That was one reason he kept sending so many receivers on deep routes: to force the defense to run with them. var sellablestring4 = "GAZETTE FILE PHOTO"; He left West Rome in 1974 to become head football coach at Valdosta. I hadnt really brought that up, he smiled. Leach hired him three years ago from the Dallas Cowboys to prepare football players to run more than they had ever run on a football field. Error! Another goal is to create as much confusion as possible for the defense while keeping things as simple as possible for the offense. But before the S.M.U. No racism, sexism or any sort of -ism He was an assistant coach in the Georgia-Florida All-Star game, and was named State Coach of the Year by the Atlanta Touchdown Club in 1978, 1982 and 1983. In his first season as the club's linebackers coach, Hodges oversaw a linebackers corps that saw Davis post a team-leading 119 tackles, four sacks and six passes defensed as he was selected as an AP second-team All-Pro. Blackshear, GA. Watson Paul. Mike Hodges has been around UMass football longer than many of the current coaches. scored its third touchdown, for a 21-0 lead, and a T.C.U. The other glaring opportunity, to Leach's mind, was A.&M. Wed go up and watch them practice. He wont be getting metal hips, however. I dont think a lot of people realize how his hips are bothering him and how he fought through this year, Kay said. The look was more flag than tackle football: a truly fantastic number of players racing around trying to catch passes on every play, and a quarterback surprisingly able to keep an eye on all of them. The second best result is Mike Hodges age 40s in Washington, NC. He and Hodges had discussed it in passing for awhile and the timing made sense for Olson. 6 Y Shallow tells them where to run -- sort of. He never had a losing season as a head coach. University of Massachusetts Athletics Main Navigation Menu He graduated in 2010 and earned his master's in 2011. defense conceded and also which parts of the inherent disorder the defenders were failing to understand. We'd love to hear eyewitness ("That's the great thing about football," Leach says. He's married with two kids and lives just south of Grand Rapids in Byron Center, MI. var sellablestring2 = "STAFF PHOTO"; I went twice.". Strictly speaking, they were not a line at all, just a row of dots. //LBtag_id.innerHTML = ''; He asked about Hodges upcoming hip replacement procedures and listened to the explanations his soon-to-be former coach gave him. Cameron Haffner was named the OVC Freshman of the Year while Kinyon Hodges was selected to the All-OVC Newcomer team. He is energetic. They say you cant teach an old dog new tricks, but he and his staff found ways to learn new tricks for the benefit of the program.. Leach spread out his receivers and backs too. The team had slumped into the locker room, oozing self-disgust, and the players scattered into little bureaucratic meetings with their position coaches -- the offensive linemen with the offensive line coaches, the receivers with the receivers coach and so on. . He and his wife Ashley have two children. Thompson, a Hermiston native and Bulldog football player in the mid-1970s, was on the hiring committee in 2008. He brought it to a state level, longtime public address announcer Joe Thompson said of Hodges and the football program Thursday. Hodges. front line appeared tired. The only other people on it were the two Texas Rangers assigned to protect him. He was a great man. No one stayed long enough to build a program here. Schwartz didn't know if Leach's system would work in the N.F.L., where they had bigger staffs, better players and a lot more time to prepare for whatever confusion the offense cooked up. "Word got around campus that this guy had this great tape, and the place was jammed. var photocredit = "'COURTESY UMass ATHLETICS' 'Former UMass football coach Dick MacPherson has died. The chances of that happening can't be great, though. "He doesn't even care about the score. var tag_id = document.getElementById('buylinkUMassMacPherson-hg-080917,ph05'); It is the index finger and the pinkie, not the thumb and the pinkie. In Leach's first year, his quarterback, Tim Couch, threw for 3,884 yards; the year after that, Couch, who lasted for only a few disappointing years in the N.F.L., threw for 4,275 yards. Coach and quarterback now knew what they wanted to know about the A.&M. We have all the pieces here, we just gotta put them together.. Last year, after a loss to Texas A.&M. He was a good guy and a great coach. Hodges initially played college football at the United States Air Force Academy, before transferring to Blinn College in Brenham, Texas before opting to walk-on at Texas A&M. Texas Tech tries to run 90 -- and sometimes does. Hodges served as an assistant coach and a defensive coordinator at UMass for 14 years, under three different head coaches. His players havent been the only ones seeking Hodges out since news broke that he would be leaving the program. Seven of the first 11 plays were pass plays that Hodges changed into runs. YouTubes privacy policy is available here and YouTubes terms of service is available here. They were no longer names; they were numbers. HIT THE QUARTERBACK!" And I think thats a really big part of whats kept me going. A.&M. To prepare his receivers' ankles and knees for the unusual punishment of his nonstop-running offense, Leach has installed a 40-yard-long sand pit on his practice field; slogging through the sand, he says, strengthens the receivers' joints. "That's the risk of playing 330-pound guys," Leach said later. MacPherson is most known nationally for his tenure at Syracuse and in New England for his brief stint leading the New England Patriots. As a result, Los Angeles' three preseason games present a big opportunity for Bryce Perkins and Devlin Hodges, beginning Saturday night against the Chargers at SoFi Stadium (7 p.m. pacific time, ABC-7 . After Kentucky, Leach moved to Oklahoma for a single season, 1999. All have been conditioned to run much more than a football player normally does. "Be the hammer, never the nail." Its a great honor to recognized by my peers in this way," Hodges said of his induction. The trouble with running plays, as Leach sees it, is that they clump players together on the field -- by putting two of them, during a handoff, in the same spot with the ball. The first part -- Ace Rip -- is the formation, the way the players line up. Hodges competed in football and track & field at the College of DuPage . It also opened up wide passing lanes through which even a short quarterback could see the whole field clearly. Its a real loss. But its problems weren't obviously caused by the A.&M. "The guy starts poking me in the chest -- Bam! MacPherson, 86, coached at UMass from 1971-1977. All Rights Reserved. In 2016, he was elevated to co-defensive coordinator, also coaching the safeties. Use the 'Report' link on The team had no direction or identity of its own. Chris Roppe. A college team with a robust passing game might throw the football 35 times a game; at this point, 8 games into an 11-game regular season, the Red Raiders were averaging 53 passes a game. Former football coach Mike Hodges is retiring from UMass after 33 years. Submitting this form below will send a message to your email with a link to change your password. "They don't like coaching against him; they'd rather coach against another version of themselves. True, he had shaved ("It's a good idea to shave for TV games") and shed his flip-flops, his "Hawaii Five-O" baggy shirts and his board shorts for an outfit that looked vaguely coachlike. "There's no such thing as a perfect game in football," Leach says. Leach, a $48,000-a-year Division II offensive coordinator, noticed that his dream job had opened. Theres always a belief in the system.. ("Aw, yeah, the violence is awesome. Two weeks earlier, his team was ranked seventh in the country but then lost badly to the University of Texas, the nation's No. His teams won three state titles, six region championships and he led his teams to the semifinals seven times. A typical college football team runs 65 to 75 offensive plays a game. Fans of the University of Texas Longhorns deploy the thumb-and-pinkie hook-'em-horns gesture to suggest their bovinity. Devlin "Duck" Hodges was born on April 12, 1996 in Kimberly, AL. and the ball and was moving forward as rapidly as ever. But he was still smiling, still encouraging, still teaching. "You get after him -- get after him like he stole something from you." He has worked within Financial services since 1989 and set up Carrington in 1996 with a vision for a truly service orientated firm. Thompson said he was surprised, but the reasons and rationale given by the coach put it in perspective for him. Graduate Assistant - Creative Video | 2nd Season. }, Former UMass football coach Dick MacPherson has died. He knew he was not going to sleep anytime soon -- he keeps the hours of a vampire and wouldn't go to bed until 6:30 a.m. -- and so he might have even been thinking about reviewing game tape, which he usually does while others sleep. var sellablestring2 = "STAFF PHOTO"; For the first 16 plays of the game, Texas Tech lined up in seven different formations (one with two running backs, another with two tight ends, etc.) When we leave the locker room, we all know that we'll have three receivers wide open every play. He had been harping on tempo all week: he thinks the team that wins is the team that moves fastest, and the team that moves fastest is the team that wants to. if (photocredit.indexOf(sellablestring) > -1 || photocredit.indexOf(sellablestring2) > -1 || photocredit.indexOf(sellablestring3) > -1 || photocredit.indexOf(sellablestring4) > -1) { It twitched on the very spot where, two days earlier, he picked up his third-string halfback's tooth after it had been knocked out by his second-string defensive tackle. A fast receiver covered by just one player is an open target waiting to happen for the simple reason that he knows where he is going and the defender does not. Devlin Hodges is known as an American football quarterback for the Pittsburgh Steelers of the National Football League. Hodges briefly returned to coaching as an assistant at Brookwood Academy and Thomasville when his son, Clay, played at those schools. MacPherson, 86, coached at UMass from 1971-1977. 's fear of the pass caused them to leave huge empty spaces to run in. Those schools fish first in the local-talent pool. var currentLocation = window.location; . His passions are for students and their success, Kay said. 2," he said, "play together with great tempo.". THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. - Rams head coach Sean McVay has said that quarterbacks Matthew Stafford and John Wolford won't play in the preseason. When he was an assistant coach at Colby, its staff annually visited Amherst to take in a UMass practice and talk football. It was Hodges standing at the end of the field to greet the players on their way to the locker room that year, when most former coaches would have gone elsewhere. The plays change too often, in response to the defense and the talents of the players on hand, to bother recording them. Ah, yes, it seemed to occur to Mike Leach, I'm supposed to feel as if I've won. Your account has been registered, and you are now logged in. records. Community Rules apply to all content you upload or otherwise submit to this site. showed any interest in him; the only other offer he received from a serious football program was from Purdue. var sellablestring = "GAZETTE STAFF"; The school announced his death on Tuesday. Cookie Settings/Do Not Sell My Personal Information. Mike Hodges Mortgage Agent , AMP Goderich, Ontario, Canada 297 followers 298 connections Join to connect Mortgage Intelligence GDCI Activity In lieu of a Christmas party this year, we have opted. A half to the Texas Tech offense is as good as a full game to most. Ben HodgesRetweeted Central Dutch @CentralDutch Jun 26 After a quarterfinal run in the Division III playoffs, Jeff McMartin became the fifth Dutch head coach to be named the Coach of the Year in their sport. They aren't built to run around that much. We went for it once on fourth and 18 -- and we were ahead." Quitman, GA. While Whipple brought in some very key components to that team like Todd Bankhead, Adrian Zullo and Jimmy Moore, the rest of those players like Khari Samuel, Kole Ayi, Brian Smith and Marcel Shipp were recruited by Hodges. var tag_id = document.getElementById('buylinkUMassFootball-hg-080917,ph03'); Hodges joined elite company which includes legendary Valdosta coaches Wright Bazemore and Nick Hyder, former Warner Robins and Westside/Macon coach Robert Davis, and former Screven County basketball coach Harold Lee Scott. If you are the captain of a pirate ship, you cannot complain too much about lawless behavior -- and Texas Tech is one of the most heavily penalized teams in college football -- but still it's painful to watch a crew member drop treasure overboard. That's the best part.") Steve Verbit. The next year, Symons graduated and was succeeded by another senior -- like Symons, a fifth-year senior, meaning he had sat out a season. history to have three receivers gain more than 1,000 yards in a single season.) var photocredit = "'COURTESY UMass ATHLETICS' 'Former UMass football coach Dick MacPherson has died. After graduating from Warren County High School in 1967, Hodges attended Emory University, and after graduating in 1971 he planned to attend dental school. Hodges was most recently an assistant coach at Atlee, spending three years on Matt Grays staff with the Raiders. And because the clock stops after first downs, touchdowns and incompletions, Texas Tech's games are among the longest in college football. If Y has caught five passes and Z hasn't caught any, he wants to figure out how to get the ball to Z." I'm not sure anyone had ever seen the Ninja. The governor of Texas, a graduate of Texas A.&M., Texas Tech's opponent this evening in early November, was just now finding his seat, along with the biggest crowd ever to watch a football game in Lubbock. Scoring is a habit, he says; the more players do it, the better they get at it. MIDLOTHIAN, Va. (WWBT) - Take a look at area high school football programs and youll notice a handful of former UVA players roaming the sidelines as head coaches. E. J. Whitley, an offensive lineman, says: "If you're on this offense, you expect to score. He has that play he calls the Ninja -- when they all line up on one end. really stood out as potential Day 1 starters Mississippi State's Emmanuel Forbes and TCU's Tre'Vius Hodges-Tomlinson. coaches, put it this way, "He's so different from every other football coach it's hard to understand how he's a coach. Your e-mail address will be used to confirm your account. They are leaving empty spaces unprobed. But on this night Wylie was a fly on Leach's shoulder, and his eyeballs were still in their sockets. But when Tech was, as it preferred, in its passing formation, A.&M. One of the safeties, Vincent Meeks, was a ridiculously fast athlete who thought he came to Texas Tech to be a running back; the other, Dwayne Slay, had been hitting receivers so hard that they had started taking dives before he got to them. However, a chance meeting with Ray Lamb, his high school coach, who stopped in Warrenton to visit after accepting the head coaching job in Commerce, altered that career path. Don't Threaten. MacPherson, 86, coached at UMass from 1971-1977. Some of our players actually found that last week. But he coached UMass from 1971-77 and went 45-27-1 in those seven seasons. Hodges has helped evaluate and coach Saints players like Alex Anzalone, Kiko Alonso, and Demario Davis. He was promoted to linebackers coach in 2020 following the departure of Mike Nolan. Then he spotted a giant grasshopper on the turf. "The thing is, they aren't actually in the military. Method 1 Becoming a School-based Coach Download Article 1 Get certified in your state. Subscribe here. As his team raced onto the field, he gazed into the stands filled with screaming fans and wondered about the several thousand "cadets" from Texas A.&M. brought a few more players to the line of scrimmage. In this part of the country, the University of Texas and Oklahoma University are the old-money football schools, with Texas A.&M. If you forget it, you'll be able to recover it using your email address. Even now, their beloved coach had his left arm in the air, wielding his imaginary sword. Of all the things motivating Texas Tech to beat Texas A.&M. I dont have any other problems anywhere. He was a real outgoing guy. The university will likely announce the hiring of a new director of football operations this week, the post Hodges has held for the last eight years. Michael Hodges Linebackers College: Texas A&M Biography The New Orleans Saints hired Michael Hodges during the 2017 offseason to serve as a defensive assistant. David Michael "Mike" Hodges - Age 65 Mike was born on October 8, 1952 in Palatka Florida to David and Myrthel Hodges. UConn coach Randy Edsall, who was an assistant at Syracuse under MacPherson, tweeted: So sad to hear of the passing of @CuseFootball Coach Dick MacPherson today.