Jeff Chaney
Sports Scene
They coach two of the most successful high school football programs in the state.
But when asked for the secret to their programs’ successes, both had to pause and ponder all the great players they have led in all the great games before coming up with a suitable answer.
Rockford Rams coach Ralph Munger and Lowell Red Arrows coach Noel Dean are both coaching legends who are still walking the sidelines, coaching the game they love.
“To be honest, I can’t give you a good answer to why we’ve been so successful, as I myself haven’t been involved with a number of other programs you can compare it with,” Munger said. “That’s hard to answer. We have been fortunate to be able to maintain a stable staff and have been fortunate to have half of our staff from seventh through 12th grade of former players. Within that stability, we have staff members that are all on same page.”
Dean has had that stability as well, which has helped him keep reloading the Red Arrows roster year in and year out, even with the graduation of some former great players like Mark Catlin, Keith Nichol, and Gabe Dean.
“Out at Lowell, you have to develop a program,” Dean said. “You have to build it from a the ground up, and hopefully the kids are playing for community and playing for each other. If that mindset is there, they will have great success.”
Success has been there for both programs.
Currently Rockford is on a streak of 19 straight playoff performances. During that time, the Rams have been to five Division 1 state finals and have won three state titles.
And over at Lowell, the Red Arrows have 14 straight playoff appearances. During its run, Lowell has been to five Division 2 and 3 state finals and has also won three state titles.
The records for the programs during this time – Rockford is 182-39, while Lowell is 147-26.
“The young men are first, and then all our coaches have a deep passion to work with kids and coach football,” Munger said. “We just keep going about doing the things the way we do them. In the end, we prove them to be successful, and obviously we have had the talent over the years.”
Added Dean, “We go back to work every year with a new group of kids, and we just want to win the next game and not worry about all the other silly stuff.”
But being a successful coach means having the ability to turn a new group of kids every year into the best team.
“Back when I was coaching at Frankenmuth, I was also getting my Masters at Central Michigan and I had a talk with their coach Herb Deromedi,” Munger said. “He told me two things: one, is the kids you have will learn whatever you will teach them. The other thing he told me, remember even though the kids will learn and know what you teach them, they will never know as much as you do because you spend more time on it, so it is easy to create paralysis from analysis. You don’t want to stymie their play, so it’s not what you know, but what you can teach and they can learn.”
Both coaches will try to teach successfully this year as they get ready for another brutal season in their respective leagues, Rockford in the OK Red and Lowell in the OK White.
Throughout the season, both teams hope to keep their playoff streaks alive and get a chance to make another deep run in those playoffs and to Ford Field.
The last time Rockford played for a championship was 2008, the last time for Lowell was 2011.
Each team has solid leadership coming back, Rockford’s is on the defensive side in the ball in the form of senior linebacker Brent Showers, and Lowell’s is on offensive side in senior quarterback Kyler Shurlow.
“I like our chances this year; we have a great group of kids,” Dean said. “Fifteen of the 18 seniors on the team are ranked top 50 in their class. So we have intelligent, smart, hard-wor;ing kids. Hopefully avoid injury bug.”