Coming of a semifinal appearance last year, Chris Petersen sat down with Sports Illustrated to share a bit about his coaching outlook and program philosophy and how what they do at Washington is a lot different than a lot of other places.
One of the things that jumped out to me was when Petersen was asked by SI's Stewart Mandel about his practices looking a lot different than other college football programs. After a given rep, you won't see Petersen or any of his assistant coaches shouting at players.
If that's the way a coach operates, Petersen wouldn't hire him. In his eyes, there's a fine line between building a guy up and giving him confidence, and getting things corrected the right way, and guys he hires have to understand that. Here's exactly what Petersen told SI.
"They don’t get hired here if that’s what they’re about. We’re trying to develop self-esteem out there, and that is a really hard thing to do. Because it’s usually never quite good enough. It’s a fine line, to really bring the intensity on the field and demand a standard. You have to be a really skilled coach to understand that. But we’re never going to scream at our guys, that’s not how we do it."
Most programs, especially in the today's world of the spread-no huddle, have their guys "coaching on the fly" and yelling instructions in between plays, and others are barking at their guys for a mistake between snaps. Petersen takes a bit of a different approach with the Huskies.
Head here to read more great stuff from Petersen, including why he feels like it takes incoming freshman a full year-and-a-half to two years adapt to college life, and how what they're doing at college coaches is asking kids to do what is against human nature.