Well the rumors about Dann Holland were true after all. As a former player at Pelion during the 1990s, I wanted to comment in regard to this position. Coach Holland takes control of this program with every opportunity to build it into something that it has never been.....A consistent winner. I will say that Coach Freeman did not do the worst job in the world, but by the same token, he also did not do the best job either. Speaking from experience, there was always at least one or two things that were not there. Among these were a total commitment to strength and conditioning, dealing or not dealing with cancerous attitudes, maximizing the given talent with the right coaching and developing the younger group of kids at the middle school level and little league area program. Coach Holland must address these issues.
Pelion has mostly been a laughingstock when it comes to its football program. Getting mercilessly beat 63-0 by Blackville Hilda or Ridge Spring Monetta in the 1980's in one thing. Allowing Gilbert coaches and athletic boosters in 1985 to purchase Pelion players RC Colas for halftime, only to see PE teacher football coaches allow their team to drink that poison is the height of incompetence. Throughout the 1990's Pelion finally found a little good fortune. At its high watermark in the early 2000's, Coach Freeman was able to combine a really good group of athletes with good coaching. I believe there may be enough athletic talent at Pelion along with the blue-collar attitude amongst the kids there to win at a high-level. However a culture of softness surrounded this program in the last decade or so of Coach Freeman's tenure. The fact that so many similar schools could out-perform or out-coach this team was very disturbing. Allowing Gilbert to totally outclass you on the field with similar athletes is unacceptable. However, their program has been developed from the ground up in the weight room and with better coaches and player attitudes.
The most difficult things that coach Holland must face is getting the school and community(parents) to buy into the hard work and dedication it will take to fully develop the program. He must get the kids at the school to buy into the high level of discipline that it will take to mold a championship mindset. He must at least reach out to at risk students who are naturally rough and tough but would rather spend Friday and Saturday nights finding trouble. These are the kinds of kids you can go to war with on the football field. I fully believe that he will implement a much more stringent strength and conditioning program and I fully believe that he will meet resistance (player) to it. I would also hope the school administration will allow him to bring in a coach or two.
In summation, the biggest question is can coach Holland win at Pelion? I personally believe he can. Historically, HKT has been really bad but Coach Holland was able to win at a very high level there. He may only win a few games a year his first couple of years but in the long term he can turn the school into a winner. If they can make it deep into the playoffs, I'll count that as a huge success. If they can start swinging the tide against Swansea and Gilbert again, that's even better. The culture change at that school will be very difficult, but the opportunity to do things that they have never done before will be well worth the bumps in the road.