Kearns- Coach Matt Richards is the head coach of the Kearns High Cougars football team. Many people say that he is an amazing coach, and fully deserves this award.

The Cougar Claw interviewed coach Richards, and asked him what does it mean to him to be Coach of the Year, “I don’t know if I really even deserve it, I mean I don’t go out and play, the kids are the ones that play. They are the ones that really made the improvement and did the work.” Even though Richards doesn’t believe that he deserves the award, all of his players and his coaching staff believe that he deserves it.

In an interview with Mr. Garcia a fellow coach, the Cougar Claw asked what is Richards like as a coach, “Matt Richards is one of the, if not the, hardest working coaches that I have ever coached with, he’s diving and passion to be the best that he can be is second to none.”

“Coach Richards is kind of like an older brother or a father figure to a lot of these guys, in the sense that he is there, wants the best for them, and he makes sure he holds them accountable and responsible for their actions. I think there is an unconditional love from him from the players where they respect him and would do anything for him,” said Mr. Garcia when asked what is the relationship between coach Richards and the players.

“The team really improved a huge difference from where we were in the spring, in May and June to now. They really made the improvement from the beginning of the season to the end of the reason.” said Coach Richards when asked what his most successful thing he has made as a coach this year.

Nathan Pendleton believes that he is a great coach because he enforces great discipline just to make sure his players stay in line, and to make sure the athletes give a 110 percent effort in a game, and if they don’t, he doesn’t accept it anything below that. Mekhi Bright believes that he is a great coach because he brings a lot to the team, Mekhi feels that they really didn’t have the numbers on the team, but he still brought the best out of all of his players and they still ended up making history again this year as they did last year.

Another thing that makes Richards a great coach is because he is very supportive of all of the players, he’s very connective with all of them and doesn’t only want to make them better in the sense of being football players, he wants to make them better as an individual.