Harrell keeps North football afloat
The message Mickell Harrell gives his football players is powerful and true.
“If you’re able to play here and make it,” he says, “you’re able to make it and do anything.”
The Milwaukee North coach is living proof. Twenty years ago, he came up the ranks at North under coach Adam Walker and earned playing time as a freshman for a team that was a surprise contender in the City Conference. In his senior year, the team didn’t win a game.
“I think I got my grit and my grind from playing here,” he said.
The determination has served Harrell well at North.
The Blue Devils are far from a blueribbon program. Harrell’s teams have won just three games since Milwaukee Public Schools resuscitated its program three years ago. Not counting a game won by forfeit in 2017, North has lost 26 straight games. This year their average margin of defeat was 37 points.
The school hasn’t made the playoff since 2009 and has just four appearances in its long history.
By most measures this was a tough year. However, coaches like Harrell and teams like North need to be celebrated, too.
As much as football coaches emphasize that the game has never been safer, it is still taking a hit when it comes to participation numbers and public perception. Keeping programs afloat is more important than ever.
Harrell is the man responsible for that at North.
He has provided a level of stability for the Blue Devils that only a couple of schools in the City Conference can match. Counting the 2014 season, when North played a junior varsity schedule, Harrell has five years under his belt as head coach. The only coaches who have been at their current school longer are Riverside’s Patrick Wagner (18 seasons) and King’s Tom Wozniak (eight).
“As you watch your kids grow up and you deal with situations, you always wonder how much longer will you have the fire to do it,” said Harrell, who is assisted by Steve Ivory Jr. and Nick Craft as well as Chris Jones.
“But on the flip side of that, I just think if I’m not doing it for these young men like Coach Walker and some of these other coaches did for me, then who is going to do it? That’s a motivation for me: to keep the cycle going.”
The combination of North’s history of struggle in the sport and socioeconomic issues among the student body that affect participation levels make Harrell’s job arguably the toughest in the area.
And yet since the program has returned to varsity competition, it hasn’t forfeited a game due to low numbers and has finished every season.
When they initially restarted the program, Harrell and his staff would knock on the doors of freshmen and try to get them to join the team. These days they’ll hit the kids up at the start of the school year, which now better coincides with the start of the season.
The team usually starts with about 30 players and decreases in size as the seasons wears on. Some decide the game isn’t for them. Injuries can be a factor. Some have work, even on game days. When the team played Reagan in Week 8, North had no more than 15 players on hand.
“The kids always refer to winning, but I always tell them they can be the change,” Harrell said. “You guys can help us change that.”
North had 10 seniors on its roster this season. What did they get from the game?
Senior Drequan Robinson talked about how the discipline and hard work he learned from the sport will help him down the road. Brian Humphery spoke about becoming a better player and learning how to work with people.
Austin Leflore hit on those aspects as well, but he also talked about having the opportunity to play for the memory of his older brother, who was killed in the crossfire of a shooting a couple of years ago.
He needed an outlet, and playing football at North provided one.
“I hope they take it as a learning experience, an experience that shows you not to give up on life," Harrell said. "When you’re down and out and don’t feel you have the numbers for this or the numbers for that that you’re able to put that all aside and continue to do things day to day in the right manner.
“I’m hoping that through the program that I’ve helped groom some pretty good men that will turn into good fathers, good coaches and good husbands.”