Hannah frustrated, but determined to revive Highlanders

by Barrett P. Alston, Sports Editor

When the only Patriot admitted to the NFL Hall of Fame took over as the Somerville High football coach this season, he had a specific goal in mind – to help change the attitude of the entire football program.

Sure, turning around a team that finished last season without a single win was important as well, said John Hannah, who was hired in the spring.

The wins will accompany a change in attitude that must come long before any victories, he said.

Hannah said he grew up in the football hotbed of the Southeast, spending his early years in Georgia and Alabama until moving to Tennessee where he played his high school ball. “Football was a religion.”

“We just took it more seriously,” he said.

This seriousness, this commitment to playing hard game, is something Hannah said he hopes to instill in his boys as the season progresses.

As a former New England Patriot and NFL Pro Bowl lineman, whom many consider to be the best lineman ever to play the game, Hannah is certainly well qualified to teach young athletes about the hard-nosed, gritty side of football where the game is often won or lost.

This aspect of the game appears to be the main problem area for the Highlanders. The group of players that Hannah inherited has a good deal of speed, but has serious problems with continuous physical play and hitting. “They don’t know how to suck it up when they get tired.”

“We’ve got some fast kids, but the issue is hitting,” he said.

“Football is meant to be played violently, and if you don’t have people that are willing to hit, then you aren’t going to win many games,” he said.

The coach said good hitting can be taught, but that it should be taught at an early age in Pop Warner, and that parents must be involved in order to insure the proper development of young talent. Some players simply do not like hitting, but that these individuals should not be on the field.

Coach Hannah said he is frustrated — his team struggled mightily in their first game, getting blown out by Lowell as they failed to properly execute plays and continued last year’s trend of poor hitting and tackling. But Hannah said that his celebrity status has put an inordinate amount of pressure on his players. Games have been rescheduled to draw bigger crowds, and cameras and news crews were in abundance at the Lowell game, where a cameraman actually attempted to follow Hannah around the sidelines for the entire game.

“I’m trying to coach a team and there are cameras out on the field trying to follow me around,” he said.

“All that kind of stuff gets under your skin, it’s a distraction to the kids, it’s a distraction to me, and the kids are having a hard enough time already,” the coach said.

“All of these things are happening, it puts a lot more pressure on the kids, and it’s wrong,” he said.

However, when Hannah took this job, he said he knew the challenge he was facing. His comment of, “that’s just the way it is,” in regard to the media frenzy is quite aptly put.

The pressure goes hand in hand with the extraordinary level of football knowledge and experience that Hannah brings to the table, and hopefully these attributes will help the Highlanders overcome the strain of performing beneath the public’s watchful eye.

John Hannah wanted a chance to start a coaching career and turn around a floundering program — he has his chance, but nobody said it would be easy.