How Holy Spirit football coach Bobby Snyder has revived the Saints football program
Holy Spirit Catholic school student Noah Schaetzle’s phone kept buzzing while he was cutting grass in 2020. When he looked, it was the newly-named football coach of the Saints, Bobby Snyder, who wanted Schaetzle to join the team.
“I was after him pretty hard because I'd never met him, and the kids kept telling me, ‘Coach, this kid's big, a lineman (and) dirty when we played outside at P.E. in elementary school,’” Snyder said. “I (needed) dirty and mean. I stayed after him pretty hard.”
Schaetzle declined, but Snyder insisted the sophomore commit. Snyder’s relentless effort to recruit placed the Region 1A school back on track to play varsity football for the first time since 2018.
Holy Spirit dropped its football program in 2019 because of lack of participation. Only 14 players took part in spring practice, which signaled the end. Saints coach Mark Cochran departed while the school served a mandatory three-year varsity football ban for cutting the sport, per AHSAA rules.
Students like senior William Shields and junior Kalen Oswalt practiced during the spring and were upset when the program was discontinued.
“Honestly, I didn't know (if football would return),” Shields said. “I started playing soccer for the school because I didn’t think the football team was coming back.”
Said Oswalt, “It was tough because every school around here had a football team. You wanted your high school to have a football team too.”
Snyder became head coach in June 2020 after primarily serving as an offensive line coach for multiple high schools throughout West Alabama. His presence was a life preserver for a school teetering on another year without football. He hit the ground running, recruiting and encouraging kids to play.
“His enthusiasm is his strongest suit,” Holy Spirit athletics director Richard Latham said. “He's got a lot of experience coaching football, but the biggest thing is he really likes to be around (and) work with kids.”
The Saints played junior varsity football for the last two seasons, when the program’s enrollment increased from zero to 35. Although they didn’t play 10-game seasons and went 1-5 in 2021, Snyder treated JV football as a varsity program.
“We didn't look at it as a JV team,” said Schaetzle, who joined in 2021. “We looked at ourselves as a varsity team playing JV.”
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Although some upperclassmen didn’t play varsity, others are relishing the chance.
“We always talked about in two years, we’d have a varsity football team,” Oswalt said. “That’s what everybody’s focus was. We're building up a football team for varsity. Those JV years, you can't win state.”
Two years after his hiring, Snyder wasn't sure the day would come.
“There were days when I thought to myself, 'Will I ever make it to a varsity game,' because (two years) was just so long,” Snyder said.
Holy Spirit went 6-4 and scored a school-record 377 points in its last varsity football season but failed to reach the playoffs. Four years later, Snyder aims to right that wrong.
“It's playoffs or bust for us,” Snyder said. “Our goal (is) to host a playoff game, and we realize what we've got to do to do that.”
Holy Spirit will open its season at 7 p.m. on Aug. 19 against Tuscaloosa Academy.
Derrian Carter is a sports reporting intern for the Tuscaloosa News. Contact him at DCarter@gannett.com or follow him on Twitter @DerrianCarter00.
This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: Holy Spirit varsity football returns thanks to coach Bobby Snyder
