Northside football community gives new head coach Daniel Williams a warm Warner Robins welcome

WARNER ROBINS — Thursday night’s community meet and greet felt like a church service, and new Northside head football coach Daniel “Boone” Williams was the reverend.

The anticipation of meeting the person who’s supposed to bring a historical Northside football program back into relevance could be felt in the air.

The crowd murmured about how things used to be and what they’re looking forward to in the future, and after an introduction from Northside High School principal Dustin Dykes and Athletic Director Mark Jones, the man of the hour took up the microphone.

The crowd applauded and gave Williams a standing ovation as he took center stage, and, in classic enthusiastic pastor fashion, he couldn’t stay behind the podium in Northside’s new gym.

As he paced and went on about his message to the community there were echoed “amens” and “tell ‘em coach.”

Williams is a Georgia man born and raised — a graduate of Creekside High School, and he’s spent his entire coaching career in Fulton County, including 14 years at Langston Hughes.

Career-ending injuries kept him from staying on the field in college, and when he was 22-years-old his then head coach invited him to come help with practice.

Upon his arrival, Williams felt like he was in over his head and acknowledged that it would be a long road for him to be a great coach. His love of football didn’t let him strive to be anything less, and before long he was the defensive backs coach at Langston Hughes.

Soon after he wore many different hats for the program, and when Willie Cannon resigned, he was encouraged to apply for the position.

“And when they threw me in [to the interview process], I got the job. I thought I knew everything. We went 2-8 [in my first year],” Williams said. “I took a 2-8 team into COVID, something the world had never been a part of…I questioned myself in so many different ways. ‘Maybe you’re not meant for this. Maybe this isn’t your calling.’ But I took a deep breath, took a big gulp and said I’m gonna do it. I’m gonna do it my way.”

From that point on the Panthers never had another losing season under Williams.

The way that he, and many other coaches, build programs is by building up the young men in them. That’s been a theme with Jones’ hirings up to this point.

Williams even said, “If I don’t get invited to these kids wedding, I didn’t do my job as a head coach.”

He outlined the core values of the team, the standards the players are expected to adhere to as well as his philosophies on the gridiron:

Eagle P.R.I.D.E.

This acronym Williams introduced stands for Perfection, Respect, Integrity, Dedication and Enthusiasm.

He focused particularly on enthusiasm, saying that it’s something this program lacked last season in their 2-8 finish.

“I gotta be enthusiastic about what I’m doing out here every week. All the effort I got…I’m teaching that to the boys right now. They’re gonna understand what Eagle Pride is,” Williams said.

Core Values

The core values Williams laid out were: Relentless effort, #1-0, Energy and Fully Nvested.

Many teams adopt the “1-0” mentality, and it’s something Williams used when COVID was around.

“I told the players…you don’t know when they’re going to shut this whole thing down. We got one practice. You got one game,” he said. “If you keep stacking these wins one at a time, and not paying attention to playing before or after, you’re going to look up and you’re going to be sitting at 10-. You’re going to look up and see you’re in game 13, 14, 15.”

If you haven’t seen anything about Williams yet, you’ve likely seen “Fully Nvested” plastered on Northside social media pages.

“What does Fully Nvested mean to me? Win, lose, draw. Rich, poor, black, white, red, green, it doesn’t matter. We invested in Northside High School,” Williams said.

That response drew an endearing “come on” from the crowd as well as applause.

Player Standards

Williams outlined some standards his players are expected to adhere to.

That includes having an 87 or higher in every class while sitting in the first three rows. He stressed that his players will qualify for academic scholarships, and will not go to junior college.

He also said no hats, no hoods, no crocs and no slides.

“I don’t do these things because it’s just something I just pick on. No, I’m doing this to make you better for down the road. I’m for longevity. I’m trying to teach you something that will last you forever,” Williams said.

Gameplay Philosophy

At the end of the day Williams is at Northside to win football games, and he went through some of his philosophies for how his teams play.

“If you look at my teams play, we play fast, we play physical and we give effort for four quarters. That’s how you win,” he said.

Williams wants his offenses to be high-powered, unpredictable and balanced. When his team broke the GHSA scoring record with 792 points, they had 57 passing touchdowns and 54 rushing touchdowns.

He wants his defenses to hustle, tackle and create havoc, and that they’ll, “get the lead [and] have a good time.”

On special teams he wants to win the field position battle and create momentum.

To give an example, he recalled his state championship loss to Buford that was lost because of a missed field goal.

Then finally, he outlined their “Eagle 4th Quarter.”

In the final period of play, Williams wants to out-discipline the other team.

“How often times we’ve seen football teams [in] that fourth quarter, they get lazy penalties. They get lazy, stamina’s down, the injuries are really, really hurting at this point,” Williams said.

He also wants relentless effort on every play, for his team to commit to each other and for them to be tougher than any adversity they encounter.

“I’m hearing what it looked like in the past, I’m telling you what it’ll look like in the future,” Williams said. “It’s going to be blood. It’s going to be violent, it’s going to be physical, it’s going to be fast, it’s going to be vicious.”

That quote, again, drew an applause from the crowd.

There is still a very long way for the Northside football program to go to recover from their nose dive the last six years, but the Eagles community rallied around Williams on Thursday and is ready to embrace the future.