Experienced coach looks forward to leading Cougars on gridiron

The local coaching carousel spun its way over to Weed High School recently where  Steve Neel is retaking the reigns as head coach of the Cougars’ varsity football program.
Neel is taking over for Dan DeRoss, who plans to focus his time on the Cougars’ newly re-formed cross country team.
“I’m looking forward to improving what we’ve already done here,” coach Neel said. “Dan has installed the mentality, and the trick is to get them committed.”
A JV assistant coach last season, Neel previously held the varsity head coach position at Weed in the early 1990s.
“It was a learning experience,” Neel said. “I’ve been off and on coaching with Dan, and I spent a year assisting at College of the Siskiyous.”
Neel, who was the head baseball coach at College of the Siskiyous from 1999-2004 as well as in 2006, said, “I actually enjoy coaching football more than baseball in some respects.”
Assisting Neel at the varsity level will be Bob West, who was also a JV assistant last season.
Eric Johnson and Kevin Kreowski will take over the WHS junior varsity program.
Half of last year’s 18-man WHS varsity football roster has been lost to graduation.
Potentially 11 sophomores from the JV Cougar team that won the 2007 Shasta Cascade League championship will make the varsity leap this summer, as well as some of their talented group of returning freshmen.
“We have a very good group of kids, although we don’t have a lot,” Neel said. “But I’m confident we can compete at a high level.”
The Cougars’ JV squad ran the SCL table last season, finishing undefeated and giving the program hope in turning around the varsity’s 2-8 overall record.
“We have better offensive and defensive lines than the past few years,” Neel said. “We have some big strong kids, and we’ll use weightlifting and camps to our advantage.”
Currently, the Cougars have been working out twice a week in the new high school weight room.
Additionally, they look forward to attending camp at College of the Siskiyous on June 20.
“We’re not always going to have the natural athletes,” Neel said. “But if we can make them bigger, stronger and faster by their senior year, we should be in pretty good shape.”