All over the country, college athletes will be checking into their schools in June. Coaching staffs are going to try and meld these souls together to form a team. Some players come from football families and they will know everything that can be told to them about how to manage coaching staffs, college life, build patience and have success in the transition from high school to college. Some players come to campus with a strong resolve having been shaped and molded by strong relationships with fathers, coaches and mentors. Still others will approach a college football program with a lot of football bravado but in need of help from a social and emotional perspective that their home life did not provide.

Coaches have dozens of strategies on how these young men are socialized on a college campus and onto a college football team.

“Sally and I try to be an extension of the family. Then I try to hire a staff that is diverse enough that they can find a role model here,” Texas head coach Mack Brown said. “They can find Mrs. [June] Bryant, they can find Brian Davis, they can find Jeff [Madden] and they can find Bennie [Wylie]. I want a mix of white and black. I want a mix of old and young. I want a mix of confident and humble. There is someone in this building that one of them can find to be that role model that they need.”

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