Washington County Enterprise-Leader
Harris, Cummings Finalists For Top Honors
HOOTEN’S RECOGNIZES COACH, PLAYER
LINCOLN — For the second time in three years Lincoln head football coach Brad Harris has been named a finalist for Coach of the Year by Hooten’s.
This time he was not alone in the post- season parade to the podium with Lincoln senior running back Tyler Cummings also named as a finalist for Offensive Player of the Year.
A Dec. 9 press release making the announcement stated the veteran staff at Hooten’s Arkansas Football selected three finalists for each category in the Farm Bureau Awards, which honor Arkansas’ top offensive player, defensive player and coach of the year for each classification.
Among 45 finalists, Harris and Cummings and their families were invited to attend the Farm Bureau Awards held on Monday at North Little Rock where the awards were presented to the winners in each category.
Accompanying the press release was a statement by Farm Bureau vice president- general manager David Moore lauding the 45 finalists as representing some of the best coaches and student-athletes in the state and his company is proud to honor excellence.
“It’s a great honor to have, being a finalist one of three people up for Coach of the Year,” Harris said, adding, “It’s a great honor for our football program. It’s because you’ve done good things and your kids have done good things. I’m real proud of them to take our program to where it is.”
The other finalists were Bo Hembree, of Warren, and Shannon Sherman, of Valley View. In 2011, Harris was also a finalist after leading Lincoln to a 7-4 record in 3A and securing the Wolves’ second playoff berth in the history of the school.
“Tyler Cummings, he just had a phenomenal year,” Harris said. “It was just a great, great year for him. The game that everybody hears about is the 400-yard game but he did it all year for us. He only had three games where he didn’t have 100 yards rushing on the year. One of those was the last game where he got hurt and one was where we threw for nearly 400 yards and he was content to let us throw it.”
In 13 games, Cummings rushed for 2,058 yards on 263 carries averaging 7.8 yards per rush with 29 touchdowns and caught 22 passes for 244 yards and a touchdown.
“He had a great season, he’s a great kid, a great player. I love to have kids like that in our program,” Harris said.
“You always got to have good assistant coaches to have a run,” Harris said. “This award I’m up for it goes back to a program thing. I don’t do this by myself. Our assistant coaches do a tremendous job of getting the kids prepared to play in games.”
Harris praised the contributions of defensive coordinator Jim Meyers and special teams coach Justin Bounds and noted the additions of Garrett Hammons and Austin Lewis, who both came on board in 2012 made a difference in working directly with the Lincoln linemen.
“I felt like there was a big importance on the line. I feel like a lot of games are won and lost right there,” Harris said. “You got to see that this year how much our offensive line progressed through the year. They see the numbers that Tyler puts up, that goes back to the guys up front. I put those two guys there (Hammons and Lewis) and they did a great job with those guys.”
Harris’ expectations of himself as head football coach are simple.
“I would say just try to get our team as well prepared as possible on a game basis and daily basis. Nobody is going to hold themselves to a higher standard than I do. I truly believe in high school football. It’s about getting kids to play hard. It’s about that fine line of friendship and authority.”
Malvern coach Greg Scarbrough testified to the success of the Lincoln staff after the Wolves upended the Leopards, 41- 21, at Malvern on Nov. 22 with Cummings rushing for 415 yards and six touchdowns on 34 carries.
“Tell your kids they play harder than anybody else we’ve played all season,” Scarbrough said in a text to Harris.
For Harris playing to win was the key to success.
“One thing I emphasized was to get our kids to play at a fast and furious pace. That was one thing we really pushed them in practice and games to do.”
The result was taking Lincoln to where no Wolf team had ever gone before, hosting and winning a home playoff game, 27-13, over Nashville on Nov. 15 and following up with the school’s first road playoff win at Malvern.