There's something to be said for a personal touch.
When the Sequatchie County High School football coaching job came open, Adam Caine drove several hours to deliver his resume to school administrators personally. That made a good first impression, and after Caine followed with a strong interview process, the school chose him from a pool of more than 60 applicants to take over the program.
"We spent a lot of time on this process, because we wanted to get it right," school principal Tommy Layne said Monday afternoon. "We liked the fact that he was very straightforward and showed a lot of interest in being here for a long time.
"The whole search committee liked him from early on. He's at an age that he should be able to relate to the kids and get us going in the right direction."
A 1989 McCallie School graduate, Caine coached last season at Hewitt-Trussville in Alabama, where he was the defensive coordinator and helped that team reach the state quarterfinals in Class 7A. Before that he worked at Shiloh (Ark.) Christian School for two seasons and at McCallie for three seasons, and he was the defensive coordinator at Sewanee for three years. He also coached at Samford University twice, at Washington & Lee University and at Austin Peay as well as John Carroll High School.
In Dunlap he takes over for veteran coach Ken Colquette, who resigned after last season.
"I have 22 years in the business and felt it was my time to be a head coach," said Caine, who officially will begin working at the school on Jan. 7. "The first thing I have to do is get familiar with our kids, and then we'll start putting together our staff.
"I remember when I played at McCallie we competed with Sequatchie County, and they were always tough. When I came for my interview and saw the facilities, it was obvious that football is important to this community."
Contact Stephen Hargis at shargis@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6293.