Q&A With The Coach

This Week:

Patch.com: Woodstock is 0-3 on the season so far, but last week they really gave Crystal Lake Central a game. Their starting quarterback went down with a thumb injury. Are they a dangerous team?

Coach Nick Goshe: They are extremely well-coached. They were winning state titles in the ’90’s and went to the Final Four just two years ago. You don’t get there by accident. They are very fundamentally sound. Everything they do is well-placed.

Patch.com: Their defense appears to be very strong.

Goshe: Their defensive side of the line is the stouter of the two. But offensively they have some weapons, too. They are a very deceptive 0-3 team. We watched film on them and we (the coaching staff) were saying, “What happened here? How did these guys lose to Wauconda and Harvard?” They just had a couple of bad games.

Patch.com: What are the keys to winning the game on Friday?

Goshe: We can’t turn the ball over. That’s one of our absolutes. We don’t want to put our defense in a bad position. We have to play fast. We have to take advantage of our athleticism and speed. If we do that our offense will take care of itself, because we are so multidimensional.

Patch.com: What kind of offense do the Blue Streaks run?

Goshe: They’re a pro-spread style of offense. They like to throw the ball around, but also get into their offset “I” formation and run downhill at you. They have some kids that can play. It’s a football town; the people live and breathe it there.

Patch.com: Are there any concerns about your team’s focus with all of the homecoming activities?

Goshe: Always. It’s a blessing and a curse. It’s great because you get to bring your alumni back. They get to visit us in the gym for the big game celebration and visit with us before the game. There’s the parade, the dance, flowers and sometimes the game is the last thing they are thinking about. We have told our kids that when someone asks what are you doing for homecoming, they shouldn't be shy in responding, “The game is the most important part.” Everything trickles off of the game. The game is the apex of homecoming. I believe it’s been at least 10 years since has won a homecoming game. So that was one of our goals for the season.

Last Week:

Patch.com: What did you see last week that you liked offensively?

Goshe: Because we are multidimensional and our kids are so talented, if a team takes away what we want to do that day we go to the next thing. We wanted to go in there and run between the tackles and establish an attitude with that, but they were bringing eight guys into the box and left us no choice but to throw the ball. That’s great that our kids are flexible enough to do that, but we need to be able to run between the tackles because eventually we are going to need that later in the season. We need to work on that attitude.

Patch.com: The line has had three games in a row where they didn’t give up a sack.

Goshe: Much of the credit for that goes to Ray (Beckman, quarterback). When the pass protection breaks down, he’s smart enough and athletic enough to get himself out of trouble. We told him last year that he was slow and needed to run track in the spring and he listened to us. So now, Ray is a pretty good athlete.

Patch.com: What needs to improve on the offense for this week?

Goshe: We need the kids to understand their blocking assignments up front and to fire out. Our technique becomes more and more important because we are a bit undersized on the line. Run blocking is much more challenging to accomplish than pass blocking, especially at this level.

Patch.com: Defensively your team earned a shutout and made the plays they needed to make to preserve that. What areas were strengths for the defense?

Goshe: This is probably the fastest team we’ve had since I’ve been here, which is encouraging because that is what we train for. We train to play fast in every sport. We are a speed school. Many of our kids run track in the spring and they’re fast because of it. Coach Pitt does a nice job with the track program and it is reflected in our team speed because the kids have trained properly. The Hampshire coach really noticed how fast we played.