Tyner, Turner win on

For the last two decades, change has been the main constant in Chattanooga-area high school football programs.

With one exception.

Wayne Turner continues to stalk the Tyner sideline, growling at every missed block, tackle or perceived blown officials' call. All the while, his Rams have maintained their status as the city's most successful program.

Despite a regular-season schedule that included seven teams making the state playoffs this season, the Class 3A Rams (6-4) won five of their last six games to earn their 17th consecutive playoff berth, the longest postseason streak among area programs. Tyner's only district loss was to Red Bank, top-ranked in the state in Class 4A.

Three of the Rams' first four games were against other state-ranked teams in larger classifications, and they open the postseason tonight at top-ranked and five-time defending state champion Alcoa.

Even more impressive than this year's turnaround is the consistency at such a small school, where graduation can deplete the talent more than at schools with larger enrollments.

"One of the reasons we've been successful is because I treat our kids, and other coaches, with the same respect I want to be treated with," said Turner, who directed the Rams to 60 region wins in 61 games during one span. "I'm honest and I don't cut them slack or tell them what they want to hear. Because of that, we usually get great effort out of our kids.

"I guess a lot of guys look for greener pastures elsewhere, but I've never looked around. I've been contacted about going to other programs, but it wasn't even a consideration. I love the relationships I developed here and just felt like this is where I belong."

There are 55 prep football programs in the tri-state area, and 37 of those have made coaching changes in the last three years, including eight leading into this season. When Turner arrived at Tyner in 1991, 15 area schools' coaches had headed their programs longer than 10 years. Now Turner, South Pittsburg's Vic Grider and Calhoun's Hal Lamb are the only area coaches who have remained at one school for at least 10 years.

"It's become a bottom-line profession at every level," said Grider, who is in his 13th season with the Pirates. "It's all about wins and losses. But to me, besides his success on the field, there is nobody in coaching that I respect more than Wayne. He cares about the kids first, and he's the one who built that program into what it is now. They can compete with anybody anywhere.

"He is what a high school coach should be, and the people at that school really need to look at what they have and be grateful for all he does. He's made a lot of kids better men."

Turner came to Tyner from Kirkman after the vocational school was shut down. He had worked as an assistant at Kirkman from 1975 to '87, a time that included the Golden Hawks' 51-game losing streak, then was head coach the last two years of their existence.

Tyner had failed to make the playoffs the five years before Turner's arrival, and the program had never made the postseason more than three consecutive years.

Although it might have seemed an odd fit at first -- a walking, talking example of a gruff, old-school white coach meshing with a program made up of predominantly black players -- the desire to succeed consolidated the two sides.

Almost immediately, Turner and the Rams began burying their previous struggles beneath an avalanche of wins. Tyner has averaged nine wins per season under Turner and in 1997 became the first Hamilton County public school to claim a state football championship, one year after finishing runner-up. The program has had more than 40 players sign college scholarships this decade.

"When I came here, the first thing I noticed was Coach T's discipline," said Rams assistant Efrin Stewart, who along with Bill Crews has been on Tyner's staff for 13 years. "He had a group of inner-city kids who wanted to better themselves and go to college. He was interested in them as people and made sure their grades were straight and that they practiced hard.

"He comes off real tough, but I've never met a coach who cares about kids as much as he does. Even former players come back to visit him or walk the sidelines during games and be around him. He's like the Pied Piper. The respect he has from them is unreal.

"He's more than just the face of Tyner. He's the heart of that place."

Area's longest tenured coaches

Wayne Turner (Tyner) 1991-present 160-55

Vic Grider (South Pittsburg) 1997-present 133-31

Hal Lamb (Calhoun) 1999-present 108-26

Derrick Davis (Polk County) 2000-present 74-35