Coach Kendall Lewis of the Bensons football team explains why football stopped for a long six years due to safety concerns and numbering issues. This is his second year coaching and slowly growing the team from the ground up due to the long cause. “We started going back to the fundamentals,” Lewis stated 

Coach Lewis has brought the football team’s numbers up a significant amount with freshmen and sophomores this year after the long break. Next year, they will implement a varsity team in addition to JV and JV2. “The school is excited, and of course, the players are excited to do the things they’re getting ready to do, and having Friday night lights is going to be exciting for the community,” said Lewis

The football community is a family, along with the crowd and players’ families. “Everything has to be family-oriented,” he shows how tight-knit the team is, and that is the only way. “My wife comes, my two kids come, so it definitely has to be a family atmosphere, or this thing does not work. Whether we are winning or losing, we’re playing together.” 

Family is Lewis’s coaching philosophy. He cares about his players on and off the field. “My coaching philosophy is pretty much just to help these kids grow not just as players but also as community members, making sure that they stay with their grades, making sure they respect everyone in the community, making sure that they go off somewhere, and also come back here and help raise the future generations.” This quote speaks volumes about what kind of coach Lewis is and how he teaches. Lewis takes it very seriously while still making sure they have fun and stay passionate. He is building the program back up to be a family-oriented community with growth, passion, hard work, and teamwork. “There are lessons when you win, there are lessons when you lose, and as long as we’re understanding those lessons, growing as a team, and doing the small things that count, they won’t even matter.