New Lely Grid Coach Stressing Discipline

In his first week on the job, new Lely football coach Daniel Nieboer comes across as a mix between Norman Dale and Mr. Miyagi as he takes control of a team coming off back-to-back district championships and state semifinal appearances. And after five practices, he feels like he’s starting to get through to his players and coaches.

Like Norman Dale, the strict, disciplined basketball coach in Hoosiers, Nieboer is coming into a new school emphasizing fundamentals, teamwork, and mental toughness. And like Mr. Miyagi in the Karate Kid, Nieboer is teaching the Trojans’ roster that they must learn to stand before they can fly. Neither approach is expected to achieve immediate buy-in. But Nieboer says the team had a productive first week of practice, adjusting to new terminology, roles, and expectations. He said the coaches are aligned as well.

“I think that there are players that are excited about the change of an expectation,” Nieboer said, "and there are some that are pushing back a little bit. But even in just a couple of days, I've seen some that pushed back early on soften up and say, 'you know, this might be worth it.’”

He feels the same way about his coaching staff, which still has a few positions to be filled. One of his assistants is the Trojans' new basketball coach, Jared Stewart, son of former Lely basketball coach Don Stewart, who achieved legend status as Lely’s longtime basketball coach.

“We're thin,” Nieboer said of his current staff. "Coach Stewart is coming in brand new. He's coaching football as well. He’s on board with the semi-regimented way that we're doing things.”

Nieboer enforces his zero-profanity policy with burpee/up-down penalties for violators.

“Basically, the rule is that for every letter in the word that they use that is profanity,” he said, “they have to do five up-downs or five burpees. That ranges from the words that they might think are no big deal to the big, hairy, ugly words that they might say. So for some of those big long ones, that'll be a lot of up-downs, but we're going to clean the language up. We're going to try to be at a professional level with our vocabulary and be able to express ourselves without using profanity. And that includes coaches as well.”

Near the end of practice, Nieboer calls out perhaps 20 players for dress code violations at school. The players are told to stand at midfield while the rest of the team forms a circle around them. The offending players are then instructed to do up-downs inside the circle. Afterward, the squad is split in two and instructed to work as a team to remove the soccer goals from both end zones.

Nieboer is working on getting his team ready to participate in their Spring Game on May 19 against Palmetto Ridge.

“We have another two full weeks of practice,” he said, "and then we'll have a pregame practice on that Monday and then Palmetto Ridge on Tuesday. So we are still working to prepare to get ourselves moving more in the right direction. But more than Palmetto Ridge, we're just really focused on the Trojans and being the way that we want to be, with how we carry ourselves and how we go about our business."