Bluefield Daily Telegraph, Bluefield, WV

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June 16, 2010

CU roving football camp moves on to Mitchell Stadium

By TOM BONE Bluefield Daily Telegraph

ATHENS — Mike Kellar is taking his troupe on the road.

The Concord University football coach and some of his staff have seven towns on their road map for one-day camps this summer, including one on Thursday morning at Mitchell Stadium in Bluefield.

“Like a lot of innovation, it came out of a need,” Kellar said on Tuesday. He wanted to evaluate young football players, “to get them on our radar screen” in his words. He wanted the players to go into the fall with new-found skills.

“I tell the coaches it’s a win-win situation,” he said. “The first thing is, I think it helps them become a better player. ... It allows us to evaluate some of the best talent around.”

Separate camps were held last week in Beckley and Chapmanville.

“It’s going real well,” Kellar said. “We’ve gotten to see 90 good kids from southern West Virginia.” He said area coaches “really push it” with their teams. Enrollment also develops from the familiarity of high school coaches with the Concord staff.

“We have our contacts and connections with the high school programs,” he said.

Kellar, who will be in his second season with the Mountain Lions this fall, said that five of Concord’s signees this past spring made initial contact with the program at one of four of the mini-camps he held last summer in Man, Bridgeport, Ripley and on the Concord campus in Athens.

“We checked the NCAA rules,” he said. “We found you can go there (into communities) and have a football camp. You basically take the camp to where the people are.”

Registration begins at 8 a.m. From 9 to 10 a.m., campers go through running and agility drills. Kellar said being able to move on a football field “means everything.”

In the agility phase, he said, “We put ’em through a lot, about like what our players go through. It shows us a lot, like how good is his work ethic.”

Work on offense takes place from 10 to 11:30, followed by 90 minutes devoted to defense.

A camp is scheduled for today in South Charleston. After the Bluefield camp, other stops are planned in Bridgeport, Roanoke, Va., and Lancaster, Va.

The camp is potentially the first step in a long-range plan, Kellar said. “You build a relationship, and see them kind of grow, and maybe two, three years down the road, we could start the recruiting process.”

“We want to run this program like a Division I program,” he said. “Generally, a Division II institution doesn’t have the budget to get out and evaluate underclassmen. ... With this, it pays us basically to get on the road.”

“In four hours, they’ll get basic instruction on fundamentals, techniques and skills. It all works hand in hand,” Kellar said. “The players get evaluated by a college coaching staff. You get to know them. They get to know you.”

The camp costs $25. “It’s crazy for a kid not to take advantage of something like this,” he said.

— Contact Tom Bone at tbone@bdtonline.com

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