Rouse Raider Football: Raiders vs. Timberwolves: Part I: The history between the two staffs

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Raiders vs. Timberwolves: Part I: The history between the two staffs

This is the game I have been dreading for 3 years now. I am not ready for it and as I am writing this, I have realized I have a LOT I want to talk about!

I love the Timberwolves. I love the school, I love their coaches, I love their coaches wives.
For the past 5 years I have cheered for the Timberwolves and I listen to their games every week on the radio if I could not make it to the game. Hell, I used the CP Stadium seat up until THIS year (although I covered up the Twolve)- and then I reluctantly gave it to Stacy Childs- one of the CP wives last week (because I thought maybe it was like a curse to have it in my car).

My point is that Cedar Park and the Raiders will NEVER, EVER have bad blood between the 2 schools. Will it be a rival game? Absolutely, but a very friendly one as long and Ross and Mann are the coaches.
As proven by the 5a Texas Football Website
There is a lot of History between our 2 staffs. Let me give you a breakdown:

Coach Chris Ross

Chris coached at Olney- he coached with (Rouse's): Steve Walker and (Cedar Park's) Brent Brittain), and they BOTH COACHED (Rouse's) Corey Elrod!
Then in 1998- he became the Offensive Coordinator under at Wichita Falls High School under Leo Britain.
Chris's first season as OC was MY Senior year at Rider HS- the cross town rival of WFHS. (Rouse's Joseph Abboussie) was an all district running back for WFHS. So Chris Ross coached him. Also on that football staff was (Rouse's) Tony Cooper, (Cedar Park's Carl Abseck- who also taught ME as a Sophomore when he was student teaching:)
In 2001 Coach Ross became the Head Coach for the WFHS Coyotes. He hired Josh Mann
In 2003, Leo Brittain came out of retirement and came back to be an assistant under Chris and at the same time, they hired Leo's son, (Cedar Park's) Brent Brittain
In 2004, they hired (Cedar Park's) Michael Quintero, who went to High School with Josh (AND Rouse's Randon Johnson) AND to top THAT off, Randon and Quintero coached together at Amarillo Palo Dura!

Is this confusing? Because it only gets more twisted!

In 2005, Chris became the Head Coach at Cedar Park High School, from Wichita Falls, he brought along: Josh, Brent Brittain, and Carl Abseck, (pictured above:)
A year later they hired Michael Quintero and Bryan Brittain (Brent's brother), Joe Willis, and Connie Cochran

Coach Josh Mann

Then in 2008, Josh was named the Head Coach at Rouse High School. He brought over Canyon Ridge Middle School's Darrell Knight, who came up on the weekend's and helped Cedar Park, so he was basically a part of the CP staff.
Then, he hired Tony Cooper from the old (WFHS staff) and Paul Cochran (the son of CP's Connie Cochran!). Later he hired Corey Elrod, Joseph Abboussie (who were both coached by Coach Ross, and Coach Walker and Coach Abseck and Coach Cooper also coached Abboussie!) in High School AND hired Randon Johnson, who went to HS with both Michael Quintero and Josh!
Josh also hired Nick Rogers at Wiley Middle School... Nick went to school with my brother and Josh, Quintero, Cooper, Coach Ross, coaches AGAINST Nick when he played at Rider HS.
Then to top it off, John Speed used to coach UNDER Leo Brittain at Richland, and is good friends with the Brittain brothers. Bryan and Brent recommended John to Josh!

And the one man that we really and truly have to thank for these 2 awesome staffs is Leo Brittain (pictured with his wife Karen). Leo is truly an amazing man and it has TRULY been an honor to be friends with his sons, their wives and to know him and Karen. Thats an entirely separate blog, which I will get to one of these days very soon.

When the Ross's, the Mann's, the Abseck's and the Brittain's moved here from Wichita Falls, it was HARD. When you move to a school that already has an established staff, the staff that is left is not always nice and well, women are worse than men, so they were less than thrilled to have us there.
It was an adjustment. I was pregnant with Judson, Jace was 18months old, Leslie Ross had 3 kids- 2 in school and a 1 year old, Audra Abseck only had Gunnar at the time and Heidi Brittain has 3 older girls, but Heidi wasn't crazy about moving, so it was hard and to top it off we had these wives on the old staff that didn't really want us there, so the 4 of us, pretty much had to stick together, and we made it work. We had a wonderful time and I have to say that these girls are still some of my closest friends. I love the Rouse staff and I love our coaches wives and I can say that as a WHOLE, our staff is the best that I have ever been a part of, but there is a bond that we formed at Cedar Park because it WAS so hard and they are equally as wonderful. It was really hard for me because I had NEVER been away from my family and I missed them. And the rest of them had been away from their families for a long time.
After that first year, Chris added new coaches because some of the other ones from the old staff had moved on and, we added Lisa Brittain, Kathy Cochran, Amber Willis, Katie Schmidt, and Rita Smith. I love these ladies. I only knew them as CO-coaches wives for 2 years, but we became great friends and I still keep in touch with each one of them.
It was amazing to be on the same side cheering for so long and I honestly didn't think I would ever have to cheer against them in the same district, but the time has come for me to "put on my big girl panties" and get over it because for the next 2 years at least, we are enemies during week 3 of district!

Cedar Park has a great staff and great wives and great kids, its going to be neat to see the kids that Josh coached as Freshman, play in their last year at Cedar Park against us. They have a great team and while I hope we beat them- I hope that Cedar Park will go on to win it all this year because as hard as those coaches work, they do deserve it and our time is coming. I have no doubt that this is going to become one of the best, friendliest rivalries in the Central Texas area:)

Darrell Knight at Canyon Ridge MS

The Speeds in Decater

I think this is awesome, Joseph Aboussie goes back to WFHS, not as a running back, but as a running back COACH and he gets to coach his little brother in his Senior year- also a running back. Here are the 2 Aboussie's: Eddie and Joseph

High School Sweethearts: Randon and Jennifer Johnson's

The Willis's and their new family

The Smith family- Beau Smith is #83 for the Timberwolves!

The Schmidt's

The Ross's

Quintero!

Brittain 1

Brittain 2

The Abseck Clan

The Elrod's

Little Cochran

Daddy Cochran
****An interesting fact about the Cochran's
Paul and Connie are the Head Baseball Coaches for Rouse and Cedar Park and Paul was previously the assistant baseball coach at Leander HS. To date: Paul has never beaten his dad in Baseball- ever and Connie has never beat Paul in Football.
This will be interesting to see if the Football Gods still rule in Little Cochran's favor.
As a Head Coaches Wife, I will pray to the Football Gods tonight.