"You can't replace hard work. You may be lucky and get by with it for a while, but if you work hard at what you do, you can experience success."
That sums up the philosophy of head Blackhawk football coach Tony Travis who was named conference coach of the year, Northwest Arkansas Democrat Gazette coach of the year and KURM coach of the year, an award earned by votes from all area coaches. Not only does he teach his athletes to work hard, he works hard.
"It's a reflection of the successful season we had," Travis said. "Any time you have a successful season, the head coach gets a lot of pats on the back. It's never done alone ... the assistant coaches, the players, the managers, there's a lot that goes into it. That's why I asked Matt (Easterling) and Lafe (Caton) (both assistant coaches) to go to the banquet.
"It is a group effort, there's no doubt about that," Travis.
Travis, who has been at Pea Ridge six years, said the conference coach of the year position is voted on by coaches in the conference and usually goes to the conference winner with the runner up getting the All-Star coach of the year.
"These guys who just graduated were seventh graders when I got here. They're the first group that I've gone 7th through 12th with," he said.
Travis said he coaches football because he enjoys it.
"I enjoy the sport of football. I did as a player. I played football as long as I could play it -- seventh grade through five years of college.
"The lessons I learned in athletics, more specifically in football as I got older, I felt were important and I wanted to stay involved with it. I enjoyed the competition among coaches and players."
Some of the best games are the closest -- whether you win or loose. "The butterflies you get, the big crowds, that's something I wanted to stay involved with."
"I enjoy being involved with our athletes --every part of it -- practice, weight room, being around the guys, seeing the team develop, come together, especially when it culminates like last year! A 10-0 season -- a lot of coaches can coach their whole life and not have a season like that. You reflect when it's all over; you can't trade that for anything.
"That that week 10 win over Shiloh, the looks on the faces of those guys, the knowledge they'll never forget the things that happened to them their senior year -- that will help them be successful employees, husbands, dads. It's a satisfying feeling being part of that process for those guys," Travis said.
Travis said one of his strengths is to form bonds with everybody on the team.
"It's important to me that everybody on the team feels a value -- whether starter or the guy that rolls with someone else."
This past year, the Blackhawk team was larger than in previous years allowing Travis to put two athletes who are similar in talent in the position and rotate them in.
"That's an advantage for us. That was the biggest thing for us. Several years ago, we didn't have ability to rest those guys and when we got into playoffs ... we wore down physically. This year's team, we had the ability to rest anybody at anytime. Playing 11 offense and a different 11 on defense against those teams that have to play five, six, seven guys both ways, it becomes an advantage."
Coaches who stress good character -- responsibility, discipline, teamwork -- succeed.
"I think we try to stress that. That's got to come from the top down... What I teach these guys about football is important, but what I teach about character is more important," Travis said. "I've taught 15 years now."
"It's not near as important as what you teach them about being a good person."
Travis said he had a great home life when he was a youth, but had wrong priorities.
"I came to school for football. I made it through college because of football. I had my priorities wrong. That was a motivational factor for me. A lot of our guys fall into that boat," he said.
"Our team chemistry was outstanding last year. Every year i've been here, the team chemistry, the sense of brotherhood was there. Some years are better because of the leadership," Travis said. "Coming off heels of last year's team ... our seniors last year did a great job. They were being like a big brother to the the younger guys. Some teams haze the younger guys."
"There's huge pressure to win."
"You're trying to win when you're not or trying to keep on winning when you are... sometimes an athlete will get down on himself and it will affect the next several plays. They need to learn to handle things and get on. In football, in 25 seconds that next play is coming. You can't let what just happened get you down."
Travis said as a coach, you have to recognize which players respond to what kind of pressure. He said that when he was a student athlete and a coach yelled at him, although he might get mad at the coach, he would take it out on the next play.
"You've got to know what buttons you can push with your guys. Some guys shut down, you get on them real hard and they're done. You've got to know how to handle each kid, but also be consistent and fair. That's tough for coaches, I can jump all over player A, because I know his reaction, he will take it out on play, whereas player B will shut down for the rest of the game."
Travis is ready for spring football and planned to begin by taking the team to a movie Monday night.
"That's usually how we kick off," he said.
Then, spring football begins in earnest.
Travis, 43, is a native of Booneville. He played two years at Arkansas Tech where he was originally recruited as a tight end. When he transferred to University of Arkansas, he was a nose guard, went one year then was moved to center and was a deep snapper. He coached at Fayetteville junior and senior high for eight years and two years as a volunteer.
He and his wife, Shannan, have been married 11 years and have one son, Jake, 9, who is in third grade.
Sports on 05/06/2015