Although the Elberta Warriors will be starting the season with heavy hearts following the loss of their teammate Avery Pickle, head football coach Nathan McDaniel said the turnaround shown by the students has been inspiring.

“A lot of people preach family, very few actually live it. But Elberta, Lillian and Summerdale, the support has been incredible for our kids, it has been very inspiring,” McDaniel said at Gulf Coast Media Day. “It’s been very helpful to us, to the family, to walk through this thing together and the kids are resilient. It’s tough on them but kids bounce back pretty quickly. It’s tough on us old guys and ladies but to hear them laughing again and get them back in the flow of things again, it’s been tough but a good thing for us.”

Senior classmates Corbitt Williams and Rosson Duplesis were some of Pickle’s best friends and shared their thoughts on his memory.

“That was my boy. We were close before football, we were close during football, we were close after football, and we worked together so from Fridays, we would go into work Saturday mornings,” Williams said. “What’s best for me is that I can’t sit around and say, ‘I wish I spent more time with him,’ I was with him every day with him being my best friend and stuff so that’s what helps me get through it a bit.”

“He was my best friend, it was hard at first and it’s still really hard,” Duplesis said. “Football really (has helped), it takes my mind off it to go out on the field.”

And it’s football that the Warriors will play in Class 5A Region 1 with a group of athletes that have played a lot of meaningful snaps already.

“We’ve had a young bunch that we’ve been really excited about the last few years and now those guys have grown up a bit,” McDaniel said. “We’ve had a good summer, competed really well at the couple of 7-on-7s we went to.”

The head coach said how far the program has come in their attitude toward football as Elberta High School gears up for its seventh year of existence.

 “When we started the school, the year before I got there, I told our kids today, I felt like football was kind of a hobby. They enjoyed it and they did it because they enjoyed it but football can’t be a hobby. It’s a way of life,” McDaniel said. “For some of these kids, it’s their only way out so I feel like that whole mentality has shifted to where football has become important.”

And the school has been building facilities to match the Warriors’ mentality, he added.

“We’re in the middle of about $15 to $16 million athletic facility upgrades, all of those things combined just change the mindset of your kids and your program,” McDaniel said. “We’re excited and feel like we’re going to have the talent to match some of the things that we’re doing off the field.”

Some of that talent will come in the form of quarterback Sam Harrison, receiver Adrian Billups, athlete Brady Cole Harrison and running back John Creel. Defensively, the Warriors will look to defensive back Damien Cruz and linebackers Brice Brooks, Ethan Morgan and Noah Garcie to make some noise.

McDaniel also referenced the tight-knit senior group that has been shouldering the load in leading the way for Elberta.

“The best teams are player-led. I can say things over and over again and sometimes it goes in one ear and out the other but when your teammates are the leaders and they hold each other accountable, it’s a little bit of a bigger deal when you let your team down,” McDaniel said. “When we first got here, I had to do that but now it’s time for them to take the reins and run with it so that’s been a tremendous thing this offseason.”

Check out the Warriors' full interview as part of the third-annual Gulf Coast Media Day here.