From left, Coaches Tom Shuman and Ron Crawford and Brentwood Morning Rotary president Kirk Bednar.

Crawford, Shuman share undeniable love of the game
By SUSAN LEATHERS
Brentwood Home Page
Ron Crawford and Tom Shuman are night and day. They are about as different as two men can be. One is wiry, animated and talks like he has a mouthful of gravel in his mouth. The other is tall, stout and talks like a Southern gentleman with a mouthful of molasses.

Both make you hang on to every word.

The two opposing coaches’ teams will face each other in the annual Battle of the Wood Friday night; Crawford behind one sideline with his Brentwood Bruins, Shuman across the field with his Ravenwood Raptors.

On Wednesday, each had the Brentwood Morning Rotary Club members’ rapt attention.

Actually, despite their physical differences, the two experienced coaches have lots of similarities. Both are sons of high school football coaches. Both love the game and both demand a lot from their players.

They flipped a coin to see who would talk first. Crawford won the toss and opted to kick.

He talked about his love of coaching. This year the Bruins roster has 99 young men, a number that stretches the budget when it comes to uniforms and equipment, he admitted. But despite the fact that only 11 players can be on the field at a time, they still come out to practice and play.

“Hopefully it means kids want to be in our program,” he said.

“The only offense that will get you kicked off of our team is if you lie to me,” he said. “Lies break down all aspects of society,” he added.

There’s no I in team
The Bruins are 2-2 going into Friday’s game, having lost two heartbreakers – the first to Smyrna and the second to Oakland last Thursday night. He said he wasn’t nearly as concerned about his team after the losses because it gave tremendous effort. Its lackluster performance before it won at Independence was another matter.

“Kids today have iPhones, iPads, personal computers, MySpace. It’s all about ‘I’ and ‘me’,” Crawford told the club members gathered at City Café. “They play video games all day long. And when it doesn’t go well, they can start over.

"That’s not the case when you play football,” he said. “When you play a team sport, it’s ‘we.’”

Crawford is proud of his team and his tenure at Brentwood. Last year the Bruins made it to the Class 5A state semi-finals. Three former Bruins are on his coaching staff.

Mrs. Crawford’s one dedicated fan
A good high school coach needs two things to be successful, he said. The first is to be married to a good woman. The second: “You have to like driving around in an old car.”

His father is now an assistant on the Bruins’ staff and teaches part-time at the high school.  “My mother has only missed two football games in his 45 years of coaching,” Crawford said. “Once was for the birth of my baby sister. We can’t remember what the other one was for.

“It a way of life for us.”

W. Va. roots give way to Ravenwood
And so it is for Tom Shuman, who unlike Crawford who stood close to his audience, stepped behind the rostrum when it was his turn to run with the ball.

“I thought it might have a little bit of a slimming effect,” he said, immediately engaging the crowd.

Shuman joined the Ravenwood staff as an assistant coach in 2004, after spending his whole career up to that point at one high school in his home state of West Virginia. He became head coach last year.

The hardest thing about coming to Brentwood and Williamson County, he said, was figuring out what he and his staff could give players that they didn’t already have.

“In West Virginia, we could give them a meal, or transportation and allow them to travel to places they had never been. We could be good male role models.

"I almost felt like a missionary up there,” he said.

All kids need challenges
“These kids have things,” he said of his players today. He spouted out a list that included nice clothes, nice houses, transportation, and the opportunity to travel with their families to see the world.

In the end, though, he figured it out.

“They need to have challenges,” he shared, and he and his staff work hard to provide them. They include working as a team, working toward common goals, consistency and being respectful to others in a group.

Shuman, whose team is also 2-2, offered insight into how the Raptors went from state championship status to a fifty-percent team just a few years later.

During the 2005 and 2006 seasons (under former head coach Brian Rector), Ravenwood had players who had lots of starts, playing in 40 games or more, Shuman said. “We had one player who started 56 football games for us.

“Then we realized we had a bunch of guys who had hardly taken a snap or played in a football game.” Ravenwood didn’t have a strong freshman or JV program training players up for the varsity team, he said.

Stepping stones to consistency
That’s been a major focus for Shuman in his short tenure as head coach. “We’re trying to get the freshman program established. We’re trying to get that JV program established.” Both teams are 3-1 for the season so far, he shared. “Things like that are going to make us consistently good.”

Shuman brought the room to tears talking about last year’s Battle of the Wood, which his team lost, 7 to 35.

 “Now, I’m not one to cry a whole lot, but after the game, I was hiding in my closet, crying to myself,” he deadpanned.  “That hurt my pride a little bit.”

But he’s ready for more and wouldn’t have it any other way.

Like Crawford, whom he called a role model, he said coaching is “a calling.”

“You have to want to be a coach. It’s not just for Friday nights, a couple of free shirts and a pat on the back.”