Extended Classroom: More than players benefiting from Louisiana Line Camp
by William Weathers // GeauxPreps.com Contributor
Fifth-year John Curtis outside linebackers coach Steve Curtis knows the role the Louisiana Line Camp has played with the interior players on the Patriots’ defense.
Curtis, the nephew of the nation’s winningest high school coach, J.T. Curtis, said the three-day camp that will have more than 750 participants at Nicholls State in Thibodaux, has also been a valuable teaching tool for the high school coaches in attendance.
“Not only do the kids get better at the camp, but I become a better coach each year,” Steve Curtis said. “I have to coach kids, but I’m also around coaches that are so good. I hear them make a point that I may not have thought of in that way.
“Sometimes it’s the best way to do it,” he said. “Other coaches will be at camp for multiple sessions because they’re trying to listen and learn as well to some of the things that are being coached at the camp.”
The 38th Annual version of the Louisiana Line Camp begins Saturday, with approximately 10 NFL coaches providing instruction along with the staff from Nicholls State and more than 60 high school coaches.
The camp will once again have an NFL Famer on site with Alan Fanecea, a former All-American at LSU and perennial Pro Bowler with the Pittsburgh Steelers. He’s now on staff at St. Paul’s in Covington, where his son is a rising sophomore.
“All I worry about is that I get a ninth grader that is a good football player that has no technique,” Don Rodrigue, one of original founders of the camp. “He can run down the best running back. When we teach him how to use his hands, his eyes, and his feet, then he becomes elite. That’s the biggest part about the camp.
“We want to show them how to compete,” Rodrigue said. “There’s no scoreboard. There’s no yardage or first downs. There’s a level of competition within themselves, and within the team, to get the team better. That’s our mission for the camp.”
Curtis’ association with the camp reaches back to the 1990s, when his cousin and brother, Johnny and Preston, participated, and for the fifth year, he will bring a contingent of defensive players totaling 20.
Former Patriots’ defensive line coach Lance Rickner also brought players and was a counselor at the camp in much the same manner as Steve Curtis.
“(Head) Coach J.T. knew how good coach (Pete) Jenkins was at running the camp, and those were some of the things we wanted to implement to our defensive front,” Steve Curtis said. “I coached at the camp. I’ve told Coach Jenkins, as long as you want me, I’m going to come to the camp.”
The third-year program at Prairieville High in Ascension Parish won five games and reached the Division I non-select state playoffs in its second of existence.
The Hurricanes have adopted an offensive philosophy of option football predicated on solid line play, and offensive line coach Ty Quibodeaux’s more than doubled his team’s participation for this year’s camp.
Prairieville is set to bring 38 players – 22 on offense, 16 on defense – with the intention of taking another step forward in the trenches to move the program forward.
“This camp is a really awesome tool, especially for the younger guys coming up from the freshman level to get them involved in the basics of offensive and defensive line play,” Kibodeaux said. “Getting them flying around and establishing a unit as well. It’s a great team-building opportunity for them as well. We’re together for three practices straight in the same group. It’s good for team building and personal growth to help our team.”
This will be the third straight year Quibodeaux brings players who will benefit from sound technique and positive advice they can apply this fall.
“College guys help by coming out and show the drills, which helps us out as coaches what it really looks like in demonstrating it,” Kibodeaux said. “Lee Roussel was at Nicholls for a number of years when they were in the playoffs and won conference championships.
“Going into the fall, it helps out,” Kibodeaux said. “It also helps out with getting used to the heat. It’s hotter in Thibodaux. Three practices a day, two hours apiece. We’re on the field for six hours, and it shows when we go to (fall) camp. It shows the conditioning and the mindset.”
Prairieville’s jump in numbers is an indication of the program’s direction under head coach Mike Schmitt.
The Hurricanes have the second biggest enrollment behind Catholic High of Baton Rouge’s 57 players. Live Oak is scheduled to have 35, West Feliciana 30, Benton 26, Fontainebleau 23, John Curtis, Lutcher 17, Tioga 16, and E.D. White 14.
“Our high school coaches keep coming back to work the camp,” Rodrigue said. “They’ve seen the benefits. It’s amazing what they keep saying. Bonding and chemistry are two key words. When you’re tired and sweaty, you have a helmet, but you’re not running into anyone’s body.
“Everything is a technique sound camp,” Rodrigue said. “When I watch a group from a school that has 10 to 15 guys in the same group, the older guys have learned to bring the younger guys up to a level of competition that just makes the team better.”
Prairieville conducted a fundraiser that netted $25,000 to help offset the cost of the camp.
Kibodeaux said the program raffled off tickets during its ‘Hog Drive’ to win a cow that had been butchered and frozen.
All linemen going to the camp did their part in showcasing their skills during an on-field competition on May 2. They shuttled with 100 pounds in each hand during a fireman’s carry contest, a 20-second tractor tire flips, a 20-second sled push, and repetitions on the log press.
“It comes down to mentality,” Kibodeaux said. “It’s grown with these kids. What we’ve established is to be physical in all aspects of the game. We’re not going to be the biggest, so we have to play mean. We have to play hard. We’ve got to play fast. They do look forward to it. These kids buy into it and look forward to going to this camp. It’s really awesome to see.”
Rodrigue said a turning point in the camp’s growth took place when the trio of LSU tight ends/offensive line coach Kenny Ferro, running backs coach Jesse Daigle, and All-American center Kevin Mawae, a future NFL Hall of Famer, provided a forum for the state’s interior lineman to showcase their skills and receive high-level instruction.
“The reason the camp took off is those three guys with LSU across their shirts,” he said.
Skill players didn’t encounter such difficulty choosing camps, leading the aforementioned triumvirate to become trendsetters for the big guys up front.
The Louisiana Line Camp opened with 100 campers in 1987 and moved around the state to Lafayette, Monroe, Hammond, and New Orleans. There was a 10-year stay at Stephen F. Austin in Nacogdoches, Texas, before planting roots in Thibodaux.
Nicholls was the logistical fit with dorms, cafeteria, and practice fields all within walking distance of one another.
“Nicholls has put their best foot forward,” Rodrigue said. “The housing people have bent over backward.”
The camp has benefited from the credibility of Rodrigue, Ferro, and Jenkins, who have consistently drawn hard-working, knowledgeable assistant coaches on all high school levels that are also exceptional teachers.
“We have guest coaches that want to make Louisiana football better,” Rodrigue said.
Seven-year NFL assistant coach Brendan Daly, linebackers coach of the Kansas City Chiefs, is among the top names assembled this year. The 20-year NFL veteran has a total of six Super Bowl rings to his credit, three each with the New England Patriots and three with the Chiefs.
Rodrigue said there will also be NFL assistants from the Las Vegas Raiders, Miami Dolphins, and the Arizona Cardinals.
“To watch him coach a freshman in high school is amazing, how his passion for the game comes out when it’s hot and wet,” Rodrigue said of Daly. “He never stops. His motor runs the whole time. All of the guys from the NFL don’t slack off a bit.”
The camp has also experienced greater reach over the past several years with campers from Arkansas, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Texas.
For the third straight year, trainer Amol Scott of V-12 Elite, a premier football development and athlete training program in Boston, is bringing a group of 10 linemen to the bayou region.
Steve Curtis has always had a deep appreciation for what the camp embodies.
“It’s about a whole season’s worth of individual period for that position group,” he said of Jenkins’ format for drills. “We’ll fight for more individual when we make out our practice schedule. During the season and even in spring, you can’t just give it.
“We’re going to get all those individual things that you sometimes take for granted when you’re game planning for a team,” he said. “I can’t find anything worth the money as far as the quality of coaching and the skill training that this camp presents.”
Curtis said it’s impossible to measure the significance of the words coming out of the mouths of the NFL and college assistants. They may sound similar to what’s been voiced on the practice fields in River Ridge, but they tend to resonate differently with teenagers.
“It lets them hear what we’re trying to do, but they hear it from the Miami Dolphins’ defensive line coach,” he said. “It grows in their ears differently than hearing it from coach Steve.”
Curtis recalled the periodic interaction Jenkins had with his senior defensive tackle Justin Lagarde last summer. His words of encouragement were exactly what Lagarde needed, along with the further development of his technique that helped him earn a scholarship from Southern, with whom he signed with.
“He got pulled aside a couple of times by coach to tell him how good he was going,” Curtis said of Jenkins. “That was invaluable for the kid.”
Curtis believes Jenkins’ message is well-received each summer.
“You’re going to work,” he said. “Coach is going to make sure that whether you’re a coach or you’re a player, you’re giving all effort in every single rep that you get. This is a work camp, not to hang out and showcase things. You’re going to work and improve skills.”