Q & A with Woodinville High Football Coach Wayne Maxwell

The Woodinville football team has exceeded expectations and jumped out to a dominating 4-0 start on the season. The Falcons, who are now ranked 10th in the state by the Seattle Times, have outscored opponents 173-17, while posting two shutouts. Woodinville head coach Wayne Maxwell spoke to Patch about his teams' hot start, the effectiveness of his running game and how his team is dealing with the heightened attention.

After back-to-back 4-5 seasons, are you surprised at all about how the team has started?

No, we came into the season knowing that we had some kids with some talent that could play. We felt that about our kids last year, but we ran into some issues last year with kids just not being ready mature-wise and ready to step up to things and our growth last year wasn’t where we’d have liked it to been. Obviously, we ran into some huge injuries last year, but the biggest thing was the growth last year, our maturity, we’ve just matured this year.

Is that the biggest thing for the teams turnaround, just being more mature and ready?

Yeah, I think without a doubt, that’s just been huge. Their maturity level, being another year older and gaining that confidence. They’re mostly seniors and they are confident they can go out and get it done.

One of the things you mentioned before the season was how much speed this team has and it has been very evident on defense. How has that speed helped you change the dynamic of the defense from a year ago?

As far as what we’re doing, philosophy and all that stuff, nothing’s different. It’s just, with our speed and athleticism, guys are being able to fit up quicker, in their fits, where they are supposed to be, so when you have a little breakdown, it’s not as big, guys are able to help recover in pursuit of the ball. These guys, not only are they athletic, but they have the right mind frame to do it and get there.

It seems like the running game has set up a lot of your offense production this year. Running back Alec Schwend was an established player on the roster before this year, but how has his ability to get consistent yards on the ground helped the overall confidence of the offense?

I think it’s been great. Our line, which has done a nice job up front, they know when they have an Alec back there, that things are going to open up. It’s nice for our quarterback, to take pressure off of him, with Alec being able to do some great things back there and when Alec gets tired, the two guys coming in are pretty good themselves in Devin McKee and Branden Shrout. Without a doubt, our running game helps with the overall flow of our offense.

The team has started to pop up in some top-ten state polls and you have a group that has not experienced that kind of attention on the varsity level. Do you worry about how the team will handle that or have you even addressed it?

I don’t worry about it because we’ve had so much success and growth this year, it’s just really focusing on the task at hand. We’ve kind of stepped up our weekly goals with our kids, where we get really detailed as far as what we want to work on that specific week. We’ve had a couple of games where our opponents haven’t been top-of-the-league opponents and our kids have been really focused on what we’re trying to get done and not overlooking somebody. They do a nice job of being focused.

Looking at the schedule ahead, is there a game that stands out as what will be a true test of this team?

These guys are focusing on the task at hand. We’ve got Ballard in two days and we have a saying that the biggest game of the year is the game right now. We just need to talk that up and focus on that.