Patrick Daly never realized just how much growing pains could hurt. In his second year after taking over a once-proud Copper Basin program, Daly realized numbers had dropped to the point that he would have to start 12 freshmen.
The Cougars were too young and small to compete, not only going winless but losing by an average of 35 points.
Now juniors, those 2007 ninth-graders are the nucleus of a team that has seven wins for the first time in nine years and is one win from advancing to the playoff quarterfinals for the first time since 1992.
"That winless year was hard to go through," Daly said. "It's a credit to these kids for sticking it out. Now they're mature and they can play. Once we got a couple of wins this year, we got more confident and started believing they could compete."
Overcoming self-doubt was Daly's first priority. He was trying to turn the fortunes of a program that hadn't finished with a winning record in six years. But he has steadily rebuilt interest to the point that the Cougars (7-4) have 31 players on the roster. Tonight they travel for the second straight week, to take on Harriman (6-4), with the winner facing either Knoxville Grace or Sunbright in next week's Class 1A quarterfinals.
Switching to the spread offense helped the Cougars overcome a lack of size -- 220-pound Tyler Ramsey is the team's biggest lineman -- and take advantage of the dual-threat talents of quarterback Eric Sisson, who has thrown and run for nearly 1,000 yards this year.
Despite having two freshman starters at key positions, defense is where the Cougars have shown the most improvement, earning a reputation as a hard-hitting unit, led by undersized middle linebacker Cody Monteith.
"He's only 140 pounds, but he just has a natural gift for violence," Daly said. "He'll come up and knock you to the ground. You'd think you can run at a kid that small, but he'll stick you.
"I challenged the kids to not be satisfied with just making the playoffs. We still haven't peaked yet, and we can go further. We're proof that hard work really does pay off."
Stephen has covered high school sports in the tri-state area since the early 1990s, starting at the News-Free Press as a 19-year-old reporter. He has been with the Times Free Press since its inception and has been an assistant sports editor for more than seven years. Stephen is among the most decorated writers in the TFP’s newsroom, winning numerous state and regional awards for his writing on high school athletics. He has two children, Riley ...
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