COACH'S VIEW: A QUALITY PROGRAM BEGINS WITH THE COACHING STAFF

As we prepare for our intrastate matchup with Southwest Missouri State I am reminded about the quality of our football coaching staff at Southeast.

As a first year head coach, I am pleased to have coordinators who not only run the offense and defense but also help me in a lot of other ways.

Defensive coordinators Mike Phillips came to us from Hardin-Simmons University in Texas. He helped build that program from scratch into a championship program. He not only does a great job of preparing our defense, but he really helps me in a lot of administrative duties. He handles all our travel arrangements and takes care of other administrative duties that are new to me as a first-year head coach.

Offensive coordinator Russ Martin was the head coach at Black Hills State University in South Dakota for four years. He has experience running the offensive system we are putting in here and he has valuable head coaching experience. I go to Russ when certain situations arise because he has had experience of dealing with everything that confronts a head coach.

Our defensive secondary coach Shannon Morrison is the second player I recruited when I started as an assistant at Marshall. I recruited Shannon out of the hills of West Virginia and he was an excellent defensive back for Marshall. He served as a graduate assistant at Marshall while I was there and gained added experience as an assistant at Sam Houston State and Hampden-Sydeny. Coach Morrison really understands my system and knows what I look for.

Offensive backfield coach Kip Shaw is my right hand. He came to Southeast with me from Marshall and does a great job coaching and taking care of all of the academic paperwork. He is our recruiter in St. Louis, which I think is the most important recruiting territory for our football team.

Defensive line coach Rory Segrest played on a national championship team at Alabama and was a graduate assistant at Auburn and so he knows what winning is all about. Coach Segrest is our recruiting coordinator and has excellent recruiting connections in Alabama.

Offensive line coach Mike Chavez is a veteran coach who worked with Russ Martin at Black Hills State. He has the advantage of having worked with Coach Martin and he knows the offensive system we use. Chavez and Coach Martin work very well together in developing our offense.

Tony Joe White has done a great job with our special teams. We've gone from having the worst special teams in the OVC last year to having some of the best special teams in the OVC this year. Coach White is from Wolf City, Texas, which is just 20 miles from my hometown of Honey Grove, Texas. The two schools have a fierce rivalry and Coach White doesn't want to talk about this week's games between the two high schools because he knows what is going to happen.

Our graduate assistant coaches, Craig Knaak and George Munoz, have both done a great job this season. Coach Knaak works with our defensive ends and tackles while Munoz coaches the wide receivers. Knaak is a former area high school coach who really helps us stay in contact with area high schools and Munoz helps with our on campus visits by recruits.

Student assistants Jeremy Atwell and J.C. Kime work long and hard hours doing whatever we ask them to do.

After a disappointing loss at Eastern Illinois last week we are working hard to get ready for Southwest Missouri. We recruit in St. Louis and other parts of the state against Southwest and therefore it is important that we beat them on Saturday.

Southwest Missouri has a lot of things going. They have just installed a new FieldTurf playing surface like ours and they have a beautiful renovated stadium and the locker rooms and offices of a successful program. They have made a commitment to bring their football team up to the level of their successful basketball team.

We need to do the same things at Southeast and we need a victory on Saturday.

Tim Billings is the head football coach at Southeast Missouri State University.