A new era in Green River Football started with arrival of new Head Coach Blaine Christensen and an almost completely new group of mostly younger assistant coaches. Many of the assistant coaches played football for and graduated from Green River High School and then went on to play, and in one case coach, college football.
Matt Freeze is the only holdover coach from the last staff, and he brings a lot of knowledge and passion to the game according to Christensen. The three coaches who played for Green River are Zack Huber, who also played and coached college football; Cooper Palmer, the Strength and Conditioning coach; and Kyle Ivie, who, along with Palmer, also played college football. Also new to the staff are Dillon McCoy, who will be one of the Defensive coaches, and Terrance Webb, who coached at Rock Springs High School and will be the Defensive Line coach. Rounding out the staff will be Jeff Alcorn, a local physical therapist who previously played tight end.
When asked how things have been progressing, Coach Christensen commented, "Our coaching staff has done a really good job this off season getting to know the kids and starting to build relationships with them." He went on to say "Our assistant coaches bring a lot of football knowledge and a lot of energy into the program and it gets the kids excited to play."
Coach Christensen believes the team's off season was a success, and he noted Coach Cooper Palmer ran the strength and conditioning program, which was well attended. Christensen exclaimed that "we know how important the strength and conditioning portion of sports is and we want to make sure our kids are matching what the top teams in the state are doing."
The Green River High School Football team kicked of their 2023 football season with the first day of practice on Monday, August 14.
The team currently has 64 athletes out, with a good balance of sophomores, juniors and seniors. There is a fairly small number of freshmen, which the coach wants to build up, hoping the tradition of a successful program will inspire greater participation as the program progresses. Coach Christensen feels they have a good combination of some fast athletes along with some really tough kids, many of whom are wrestlers.
Coach Christensen and his staff have been working on the mental part of the game also, getting the kids to believe in winning and focusing on not being afraid to make a mistake as an important aspect of learning.
Finally, the Coach stated that the first day of practice off to a good start. He stated they "just want to focus on getting better and competing everyday to make sure we end up where we want to be when the season ends."
The season home opener will be this Saturday, August 26, at 10 a.m. at Wolves Stadium against the always tough Mountain View Buffalos. The Wolves will then be on the road for two non-conference games on consecutive Fridays against Lander and Rawlins before returning home for the last non-conference game against Worland. The conference season opener will be on the road against Powell on September 22.
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