Kelly football parents, coaches and administration open lines of communication after coach's resignation

When Kenneth Riedinger submitted his resignation as coach of the Kelly football team on July 2, parents and administrators were left scrambling for answers with less than two months remaining before the start of the team's second year of existence at the varsity level.

Among those people was Scott County R-IV superintendent Fara Jones, who was tasked with finding Riedinger's replacement.

"The timing was terrible for us, and it was a shock to us," Jones said. "It shed a bad light that something had happened, and the coach simply got another job somewhere else at a really tough time for us as a district. But that difficult time forced us to pull those parents in and start talking."

Jones immediately went to work, naming Lance Powers as the interim coach and organizing a meeting with parents on July 7, a day after Riedinger publicly announced his resignation on the team's Facebook page. Brian Hahs led the group of parents in establishing and writing down some collective concerns, and he represented the parents at a board meeting two days later to share those concerns.

Hahs is now the president of the Hawks' football booster club, which was formally created in the aftermath of Riedinger's resignation and has worked closely with Powers and the administration to continue steering the program in the right direction.

"They are starting fresh and new and creating a new board," Jones said about the booster club, which met with Powers, Jones and Kelly principal Dan Hecht on Tuesday. "They're over there working on bylaws and establishing their organization, making decisions on what direction they're going from here, which is pretty exciting. They've got all kinds of ideas they're throwing out onto the table, and there are parents there and some school employees as well. They're bouncing around ideas and talking with the coach now. 'What would you like to see? What do you need? How can we help?'

"That's something that I think our district is very lucky to have in that we have parents that are here year-round all the time, willing to do whatever we need them to do. ... These parents are so excited that we have a new direction, and I think they're very eager to work with Coach Powers. You can see them in the room right now just clicking. That's exciting for us as a school district to see our parents and our staff connecting this way."

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Read also: Riedinger resigns as Kelly football coach and Lance Powers named Kelly football coach

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Kelly wide receiver Dalton Huffman tries to run past East Prairie defenders during a game last season in East Prairie, Missouri. The Hawks finished 4-6 in their first varsity season a year ago.

Hahs said the booster club had already began its formation during Riedinger's time as coach.

"We've had a group of parents that have been pretty solid since the beginning. ... Whenever he left, it was a huge shock to all of us," said Hahs, who has two sons, Zach and Landon, on the football team. "Nobody was expecting that to happen, so we just kind of banded together and said, 'You know what? Let's step up our game. The most important thing we can do here is to move on and make sure that our kids have the best football season they could possibly have. To help push that along, it's going to take all of us working together.'"

Hahs said the parents' immediate concerns were magnified by the confusion surrounding Riedinger's sudden resignation. Riedinger told the Missourian his decision came about due to "a difference of opinion with the administration" in regards to the direction of the football program. However, he was approved by the Lonoke (Arkansas) School Board several days before his resignation to take over as an assistant coach at Lonoke High School, according to the Lonoke Democrat.

"Obviously, we were a little frustrated. We were scared for our team to know what direction we were supposed to go from here," Hahs said. "There were just so many unknowns, and the bottom line was that we all met together and said, 'All that doesn't matter. It doesn't matter administration-wise. It doesn't matter football-wise. We've got to keep our boys playing, and we've got to move on like nothing ever happened.'"

Jones believes continuity was the primary benefit in naming Powers as the team's next head coach. Powers was the Hawks' offensive coordinator last season under Riedinger and has been with the program since its inception in 2010.

"The kids are familiar with him. He has been here from the beginning of the program, so I feel very good that that was our starting point," Jones said. "... The timing was terrible for us. We had camps scheduled, and who's going to be the head coach now? And honestly, Lance was immediately named the interim coach because the boys were out here doing weight lifting. They had to be supervised, so immediately, we had to go to Lance and say, 'Will you be there?' And of course, he was. There were a few days before we could get that board together because it's the board's final decision before they made Lance the official head coach."

Hahs said he's been impressed with Powers' willingness to work closely with both the booster club and the administration.

"He jumped in with both feet and just made himself readily available to work with our group. He's very organized, and honestly, we're the same way," Hahs said. "... The communication with the coach has been great. We sat down with him and said, 'What's your wish list?' We can't buy everything that he could ever want, but if we could start fulfilling some of his needs, we want to take care of those things."

Since Powers took over, Kelly has already taken part in a number of 7-on-7s, including trips to New Madrid County Central, Cape Central and Southern Illinois University. Powers and the booster club are also trying to emphasize the importance of team bonding, according to Hahs.

"We've got kind of a fun event getting ready for them on Thursday. They're going to meet and practice, and then they're going to have a get-together at school in the multi-purpose building where they're going to play video games and just have fun being kids," Hahs said. "... We're just trying to build camaraderie for them. Sometimes it's more about just being buddies and hanging out than it is about football, so we're trying to get some of that stuff involved with them as well."

The booster club formally elected its officers on Saturday and has already collectively started to mull ideas in order to enhance the overall fan experience at football games. Community sponsorships and themed nights are several of the ideas the booster club is attempting to incorporate at home games this season.

"They are amongst themselves talking about all different kinds of fundraising ideas. They're also talking about doing fun things with the families at the games that haven't been done in the past," Jones said. "They want the booster club to be recognized when you come to one of our games. They're talking about choosing fan of the week and different incentives, and when booster club members join, getting a shirt to wear to the game that designates people as a supporter for the football program. There's a lot of talk right now about that and how those activities can generate fundraising to go towards coaches' wish lists."

Kelly coach Lance Powers talks with players during a drill before scrimmaging Wednesday, July 23, 2015 at Cape Central High School. (Glenn Landberg)

The booster club is also coordinating with the Scott County Youth Football League, which is a flag and tackle football league available to children ages 3-11 in the Scott County area.

"Our boys have not had the field time that the other schools have had, and immediately, our parents realized that and stepped up," Jones said. "We've got to get those boys playing when they're little and moving through and getting the time and experience. We're very lucky in that we have that with a lot of our sports -- our softball programs, our baseball programs, our community leagues are really strong. The schools benefit from that because of what is handed to us."

Jones believes the creation of an open dialogue has been mutually beneficial for the administration, the coaching staff and the community.

"We knew establishing this new program was more than what we could do on our own, and we had to have the parents and the community. I think that what happened has forced us to stop and think about how we need each other," Jones said. "I think Coach Powers has already established a really strong relationship with Brian Hahs and his group, and they're on the same page and are establishing goals. It's going to be more positive because they are going to be a more formal group, and because they are, they're going to be more organized and established. They're going to help us even more.

"... A lot of our parents have been there to support us. I don't know that the communication was as open as it is right now. This kind of completely opened it up."

Five years ago, the grass field next to Kelly High School was given hopes of becoming a local spectacle on Friday nights when the Kelly school board officially approved the startup of a football program.

There's a different look today. A football field is fenced off with signs advertising businesses from around the area. A scoreboard sits in the corner of an end zone. On the other side, bleachers line the field, in the center a new press box that was built during the offseason.

"Anybody that has paid attention to what has gone on since Day 1, when you take a place that has no football field, no press box, no anything and build it up as quickly as we have, that didn't happen by just a couple people doing things," Hahs said. "That was the whole community, guys showing up with their tractors plowing the field and leveling it out, guys who are skilled laborers that can build things and don't charge anything. There's been so much donated by the community. There's no way a lot of this stuff could have been done without it."