Sparks Surrounded by New Faces on Staff as Eagles Open Practice

JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. — Last season Carson-Newman experienced a coaching renaissance, with four of the key members from its national title runs in the 1980s back together on the field. Head coach Ken Sparks, special teams coach Mike Whitley and offensive coordinator Mike Turner were rejoined with defensive coordinator Jim Deaton for the first time in five years.

Together, the four men helped the Eagles win five NAIA National Championships and make six NAIA Championship appearances. When the team made the move to Division II in 1993 they played for the national championship three more times. Back together in 2009, the Carson-Newman crew took the team all the way to the D-II semifinals for the fourth time, before losing 41-27 to Grand Valley State in Allendale, Mich.

All good things must come to their final end, however. Jim Deaton has moved on once again and for the first time in over 30 years, Sparks will enter a coaches' meeting without Mike Whitley in on the sidelines.

"Coach Whitely was with me for 30 years and I understood him and he understood me," Sparks said. "When you go in a meeting room and now you have to explain something you haven't had to explain in 25 or 30 years, it's different deal. It is a new ballgame for me. This is the most major coaching staff changes we've had since I've been here."

The biggest change was a natural one. After returning last year to coach the linebackers, former Carson-Newman great Mike Clowney will take over the defense coordinator duties.

"We hated to see Coach Deaton go," Clowney said. "He was my coach when I was here. This was a step up for me, but not for what we do here at Carson-Newman. One thing that's made Carson-Newman successful is the stability. We're going to continue to do what we do, just improve on it fundamentally. We can move on rather than start over."

The Eagles aren't starting over, but starting anew at some key coaching positions. Clowney isn't the only coach to step into Deaton's shoes. Former Ooltewah High School defensive coordinator Doug Greene will take over for Deaton coaching the defensive backs. Greene left the head coaching job behind at Ooltewah to join the Eagles staff. The position was just too good to pass up.

"An opportunity like this doesn't come around but once," Greene said. "I really wanted to be involved with a program that deals with the whole man, not just the football player.

That excited me. It's challenging like I knew it would be, but it's been good. There's a Carson-Newman way of doing things and I want to make sure I stay with the traditions of Carson-Newman because it's obviously working."

The "Carson-Newman Way" is something that Sparks says may come as a surprise to incoming freshmen on the team.

"They're going to be in an environment that's going to challenge them not only as a football player but as a total person," Sparks said. "We're going to talk about life as much as we talk about football. That's probably a shock to most of them. We put life first and then football comes underneath that somewhere. They're going to be coached by coaches that aren't going to cuss them. They're not going to be coached from the outside in, but the inside out."

The changes don't stop with the defense. First-year coach Aaron Hutsell joins the Carson-Newman staff as wide receivers coach after spending the last four seasons as an assistant with Murray State. Sparks is already excited in what he sees from his young coach.

"Aaron Hutsell is a guy that gets me fired up," Sparks said. "He has "it," whatever "it" is. He has the ingredients of being a great football coach. He finds ways to make himself better but also makes all of us better. He does what a lot of young coaches don't want to do anymore and that is develop himself. A lot of them wanted it handed to them. He's looking at the big picture."

That big picture starts with a great challenge for Hutsell, helping find two new starters and develop an entirely new group of receivers for the Eagles.

"We're going to have to get a lot of guys caught up really quick," Hutsell said. "We've got a talented and hard working group that's going to do what it takes to get there again. We have some real weapons outside that can create some mismatches in the pass game."

Former Cocke County High School head coach David Crawford will take command of the best running attack in the country as the new running backs coach for Carson-Newman. Crawford has been with the program for the last two seasons as a voluntary assistant and Sparks said he was excited for the chance to hand the keys to C-N's high performance rushers to Crawford.

It's perhaps another assistant, though, that has Sparks the most inspired as the season begins. Former safety Denares Waites will assist Greene with the defensive backs. Waites had his last two seasons cut short with the Eagles due to knee injuries and has acted as an assistant coach ever since.

"Mark it down, Dino Waites is going to make a great football coach," Sparks said. "He already knows how to communicate right is right and wrong is wrong. He and Doug are going to be a good team in the secondary."

This team of new players and coaches began coming together last Friday when fall camp opened. Now they begin the process of not only build great football players, but great men as well.

"That's what keeps you going," Sparks said. "You have different individuals and the Lord has different plans for them. You have a different chemistry as a football team. That makes it fun. I don't know how coaches who coach just for that scoreboard down at the end of the field keep going. It'll energize you, but it won't conquer that deep thirst you have inside."