Oskaloosa Head Football Coach Talks After Heartbreaking Loss
Oskaloosa vs Newton September 2, 2011 High School Football
Newton, Iowa – Oskaloosa Head Football Coach Mark Schilb took some time after the game, Friday night at Newton, to chat with his players. Afterwards coach Schilb said, “It was two pretty good teams going at it.”
Even with the tough loss, it was very evident the improvement the defense had made from the previous week. Coach Schilb agreed saying, “I think our defense played a lot better. I think we played harder four quarters tonight.” Coach Schilb told his team that he was proud of them, as he thought they played harder this week than they did last week. “Last week we walked off, everyone was happy cause we won. But I feel like we played a little better tonight, defensively mostly. They’re a good team. They’re physical and I think their going to win a lot of games.” Schilb said.
Schilb took responsibility for the loss, “It’s on me. It’s on the coach, not being able to overcome personnel changes. … I’ll take responsibility for that loss. I think our kids played hard.”
Speaking of the greatly improved defense, Schilb stated that they changed a lot of stuff up. “Our defensive line and linebackers were a big emphasis, they showed they were going to play harder.”
With the humidity out, some slipping and ball handling issues came up. “It’s just very humid; hot. Gloves are slick, forearms are slick, the hands are slick, and the field turf was just perfect.” Schilb said, and went on to point out, “It was a big deal, we can’t drop the ball.”
Looking towards next week, Schilb stated, “Just continuing to get better at what we’re trying to do. I’m going to say this again, personnel when we have an injury, getting personnel out there, getting lined up on all the scenarios. We hurt ourselves a lot there in the first quarter, end of the first into the second with illegal procedure calls. We’ve got to get up to the line of scrimmage and get set.”
Schilb says they will continue to work on these in practice and “we’ll get better”.
