Today’s interviewee is new Parkview coach Joe Sturdivant, whose team opens its season Wednesday at Kell in the Corky Kell Dave Hunter Classic. It will be the second game of the GHSA season following the Johns Creek-North Atlanta opener to the Kell Classic doubleheader. Sturdivant was a starter on Parkview’s 2000-02 championship teams that went 45-0. He most recently was head coach at Providence Christian. He’s coached at Rabun Gap and IMG Academy, in Europe and at alma mater SMU to start his career.
1. What’s it like being back at your alma mater? “It’s pretty crazy. It’s what I thought I was going to be doing in high school. I was already making my own playbooks. I thought one day I was going to be head coach at Parkview. A year ago, I thought it was never going to happen, so it’s definitely been pretty surreal. I think I’m the right guy for the job, and the job is the right one for me, to be leading these players and teaching them to be men. I’ve seen Parkview and what it’s supposed to look like at its best, and I think I can get it right back to doing those things immediately.”
2. Most people see your biggest weapons on offense as wide receiver Mike Matthews and running back Khyair Spain. What stands out most about those two? “Mike is an extremely talented basketball player, and that comes out when he plays football. He sees the field well and goes up and gets the ball like he would rebounding a basketball. He can do things in the air that most can’t. He can manipulate his body. He never wants to come off the field. He plays safety also. Khyair is extremely underrecruited, which blows my mind because he’s one heck of a running back. He’s explosive and does well on the track circuit. There’s not many places to hit him. He’s put together. He also starts at middle linebacker. These are old-school guys. The game is starting to get soft, and that’s when old-school guys start to shine, and these two kids are that.”
3. Quarterback might be a question mark to some because you graduated Colin Houck, a three-year starter who wound up a first-round MLB Draft pick. How does that position look? “We’ve got two kids right now competing for the job. One is Jaden Jenkins [who made honorable mention all-state last season at St. Francis]. The other is Cooper Frank. Both are what you want in a quarterback – cool, calm, collected. They’re accurate and make good decisions. They’re the right fit for what we do and the type of receivers we have. We need a guy not wanting to throw the ball every play chasing stats. We need operators. We run a pro-style offense and protect the ball, and both can do it. Our third and fourth kids [at quarterback] are also right there. All of our quarterbacks practicing are pretty darn good.”
4. What’s transferable to today’s game from what Parkview did 20 years ago? “I believe it’s all transferable to today. It’s always about blocking and tackling. The most physical team always wins. I haven’t changed how I coach because it’s new-age kids. I don’t think kids have changed. I think coaches have gone soft. None of us liked going through the old school three-a-days in the heat of the day. The approach I take with football is that this is what it takes to be great, and we’re not wavering. People would say I’m the crazy one. Maybe we’ll find out. You want to play seven-on-seven, do it. We’re going to take the ball and try to run it right up your rear end. We’re going to put the best 11 players on defense. We’re going to play great defense and pound the rock.”
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