There’s change in the air at Northampton High
Northampton High’s resurgence in football has had media, stat people, historians and people who care about the program going through the record books for the last time this or that happened.
Konkrete Kids coach Kyle Haas said when Northampton won eight games last season he reminded the seniors the program hadn’t had a winning season since they were in second grade.
The last time the K-Kids won a league championship, none of the current players were born.
With a win over Allen Friday night at Al Erdosy Stadium, Northampton will clinch a share of the EPC North title and could win the crown outright with a victory over visiting Pocono Mountain East Oct. 18.
While acknowledging there’s still plenty left to do before the Konkrete Kids officially return to their glory days as an elite program, Haas and the players feel a transition is underway.
The culture of Northampton football is changing for the better and while many attribute the K-Kids’ 14-5 record over the past two seasons strictly to going from the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference’s rugged South Division to the softer North, Haas believes it goes deeper than that.
“I credit last year’s seniors and this year’s senior group,” Haas said. “They stuck it out and weathered the storm. There are a lot of kids in that school who played football when they were younger and stopped playing because they heard people say they’re not any good. These kids persevered.”
That’s why a championship of any form would be special for the 19 seniors on the roster.
Players like Tyrese Brandon, Jared Russell, Nick Caiazzo, Mason Gunkle, Spencer Cole, Aidan Kromer, Dario Walnock, Josh Gaycheck, and Tyler Walling have been involved with Northampton football starting with the youth feeder teams. They have seen the rough times and now enjoy better times.
“When we were freshmen and sophomores, we went through a really bad slump,” Gaycheck said. “When Coach Haas came in, we knew we had to be committed and buy in right away and we have.”
The perception of the program, even within the halls of the high school, has changed.
“When your high school football team is good, it’s always a fun time,” Gaycheck said. “Last year was the first time we were in big games. Now, we have more experience.”
Haas, the grandson of late Hall of Fame football coach Fritz Halfacre, had experienced success as an assistant coach in South Carolina and at local stops such as Allentown Central Catholic, Salisbury, Freedom, Emmaus and Bethlehem Catholic. He won a District 11 title as an interim head coach at Becahi in 2016.
He admits that when he was looking at opportunities to become a permanent head coach, Northampton wasn’t initially high on his list because the program had struggled for a long time.
“The more I thought about it, the more I thought it would be a great challenge to start fresh and see if you could build something at Northampton, which would be a great accomplishment,” Haas said. “I knew I wasn’t going to be able to do it unless Mike Feifel, Dan Kendra, Shawn Daignault, Bob Kohler and a bunch of other guys joined me. I needed good guys to implement a quality program.”
Most of his assistants had won with other programs, but like Haas, they took on the challenge of a program that hadn’t had much success in recent years.
“I think the challenge was alluring to them,” Haas said. “It was one more chance for some of the guys to go out and prove one more time how good they are. We all came from different places. Feifel and Chris Gordon were the only two who had coached together before at Southern Lehigh. Yet, we all get along amazingly well.”
The biggest challenge was instilling a mindset that championships start in the weight room.
“The first thing we said was that the kids would commit to the weight room and we wouldn’t tolerate excuses and we’d hold them accountable,” Haas said. “We decided that we’d coach the kids up and hope they’d have some success to reinforce everything we’re preaching to the kids.”
Haas doesn’t apologize for the program shifting to the North Division and he’s happy Northampton will remain in that division for two seasons after this one.
“It gave us time to catch up in the weight room and gave us an opportunity to have some success, which reinforced everything we’re trying to do,” Haas said. “Now, we’re at a point where the program is self-run because the kids know what the expectations are. We have talented kids coming up and when they get here they will know what’s expected of a Northampton football player.”
Even if K-Kids win the next two games to claim the division, the Week 10 game against Whitehall will be important because Northampton hasn’t beaten a current member of the EPC South since beating Becahi 35-6 in September 2012.
“We want to get one of those South teams for once,” Cole said. “It’ll show how far we’ve come and show we can compete with those South teams.”
A good showing in the District 11 6A playoffs would provide further validation.
“This is just the beginning,” Russell said. “It’s just going to keep building up from here.”