March 17, 2022 at 12:59 p.m.
Spring football at the Dome
Hawgs and Dawgs camp draws football players from all over the state to Rhinelander
Spring football at the Dome
By Brett LaBore-
The day started with the lineman camp. Players were divided into two large groups - one with offensive live instructors and one with defensive line instructors - to learn proper technique, stance and form.
Instructors and coaches walked around, critiquing and helping campers throughout the session.
One of the instructors for the offensive line was Tyler Beach, a senior on the Wisconsin Badger football team. He talked about how important the basics are when learning the game.
"The basics are huge for an offensive lineman because if you don't have good basic fundamentals, you're going to fall apart as a player," he said. "You got to figure all those things out first before learning all the special stuff that we start teaching. So like giving these guys a chance to learn the basics from top-level competitors is really cool."
On the defensive side of the ball, players learned two different stances - a run stance and a pass stance. Both are used when playing on the defensive line.
Rodas Johnson, a sophomore on the Badgers, talked about the goals he had for the camp and what he wants to get out of the campers.
"For me, it's positive development honestly. As a kid, I wish I had somebody I would say of my repertoire, that has my resume, to come back and give back to the kids, honestly," he said. "Being able to teach them things that I never learned until I got to college. So just being able to give them that knowledge is the key for me and doing it while having fun."
Eventually, all the campers broke out into stations where they learned a variety of different skills from the instructors. These stations helped the campers get a taste of a little bit of everything.
"The stations are sweet because each guy... kind of brings their own creativity to it and their own knowledge and development. We're able to provide different aspects to things, we're able to provide different coaching and teaching to each drill," Beach said. "It allows each guy to get up close coaching while also being productive about it."
Camps like these are good for players who want to get better in the offseason.
"Football is a year-round sport because you play 10 game seasons. Those 10-game seasons amount to eight months of work, nine months of work," Johnson said. "So that work is building the technique and your body up to take on the strain of a double team cause football is a contact sport."
This is the second year that the Hawgs & Dawgs has taken place in Rhinelander. It all started with Rhinelander High School football offensive line coach Paul Ellenbecker.
"For a long time I envisioned getting more coaches involved from the whole area," he said. "Tyler (Beach) bringing up some other Badgers to expand on it and get other schools involved."
The camp has grown since last year with more numbers. They had 85-90 kids for the lineman camp a year ago and have expanded it this year.
"We were about 310-315 campers total this year. It just grew," Ellenbecker said. "It turned into a really good camp and awesome to see all the coaches work together too."
In addition to the lineman camp, there was a youth camp and a perimeter camp in the afternoon and evening.
"It's kind of cool cause a lot of the youth parents wanted us to do a youth camp," Ellenbecker said. "(We said) 'let's get 40-50 kids' and we got over 80."
The Hodag Dome is the perfect place to host a big camp like this with so many people.
"Just the space that we have available. Not many people can run a camp in March and be confident with the weather. When we built the dome, this is the type of thing that the community wanted," Ellenbecker said.
It wasn't just the Badgers who made an appearance at the camp. RHS alum Connor Lund, currently a member of the UW-Oshkosh football team, and a number of other former Hodags were instructors for the camps.
Look for these football camps to be back next year, even in the summer.
"We already set the date. We're looking at March 11 for next year. We're also doing some satellite camps and summer doing more camps with Hawgs & Dawgs," Ellenbecker said. "We're definitely going to have it next year and grow it... figure out a way to keep the same concepts because what we did definitely worked."
Brett LaBore may be reached at [email protected] or [email protected].
Comments:
You must login to comment.