FootballScoop is proud to announce that Chad Scott is the 2020 FootballScoop Strength & Conditioning Coach of the Year presented by AstroTurf as selected by prior winners.
Coastal Carolina was the surprise story of college football in 2020. Coming off a 5-7 campaign in 2019, the Chanticleers ran through the regular season unbeaten. After opening the season with a 15-point win at Kansas, Coastal went to Lafayette and beat No. 21 Louisiana, entered the AP Top 25 for the first time in October, and outlasted No. 13 BYU, with College GameDay on the scene, to win the ultimate 2020 game.
At 11-1 with a Sun Belt title and a No. 14 final ranking, 2020 was the best year in program history, and it wouldn't have been possible without world-class strength training.
The Chants out-rushed their opponents by more than 70 yards per game and out-possessed the opposition by eight minutes and thirty seconds per game. They were also great in gotta-have-it situations, ranking fourth in the nation in converting 52.4 percent of their third downs, and 75 percent of their red zone opportunities into touchdowns, tied for 10th nationally. Defensively, Coastal yielded third down conversions just 38 percent of the time and touchdowns on 55.6 percent of opponents' red zone opportunities.
Such numbers indicate a team that was not only physically strong, but one that was conditioned well enough to remain mentally sharp in crucial situations.
That training was also evident simply by who appeared on the field week in and week out. Coastal enjoyed an advantage over its foes by fielding the healthiest team on the field.
The Chanticleers started the same 11 players in nine of 11 regular season games, and the other two were slight lineup tweaks, not changes made necessary by injury. On offense, three starters missed a game apiece.
“Our strength coach, now he’s into truly his second year,” head coach Jamey Chadwell told the Myrtle Beach Sun News in December. “He’s had an opportunity to really train some guys and they understand how it's going. I think that’s part of it because all your strength training is to try to reduce injuries, and our players to their credit are understanding what it takes to try to stay healthy too, what you have to eat and what you have to do to try to play a long season.”
“We’re just trying to take care of our bodies so we can keep everybody,” senior defensive lineman C.J. Brewer echoed. “Last year that was a lot of our problems, there were a lot of injuries that were hurting us and were causing us to lose games. But we feel we’ve come together as a team and are just trusting the process.”
Chadwell told FootballScoop one of the things that truly sets Scott apart is how he is able to get the players to truly look forward to workouts. "Coach Scott does a great job of keeping things fresh in there. The players are excited to get to the weight room because he makes it fun and he teaches them why everything they are doing is important. He's instilling leadership in a way the players enjoy."
Hired in 2019, Coastal Carolina represents Scott's first experience at the FBS level. An Eastern Kentucky graduate, he played full back and long snapper for the Colonels before entering the strength profession at his alma mater. He arrived at Coastal after six years at Charleston Southern, where he oversaw the physical development of all 14 teams as the assistant athletic director for student-athlete development and the head strength and conditioning coach.
The FootballScoop Coaches of the Year awards presented by AstroTurf are the only set of awards that recognize the most outstanding position coaches in college football. The prior winners selected this year's winner.
Previous winners of the Strength & Conditioning Coach of the Year award are Don Sommer (TCU, 2008), Joey Batson (Clemson, 2009), Kevin Yoxall (Auburn, 2010), Shannon Turley (Stanford, 2011), Kaz Kazadi (Baylor, 2012), Pat Ivey (Missouri, 2013), Zac Woodfin (UAB, 2014), Ken Mannie (Michigan State, 2015), Tim Socha (Washington, 2016), Zach Duval (UCF, 2017), Lew Caralla (Buffalo, 2018), and Tommy Moffitt (LSU, 2019).
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