From the Sidelines: Kevin Smith Q&A

ODUSports.com is working on a variety of ways to continue to give Monarch Nation informative and creative content throughout this pandemic. The latest is a series of Q&A's with the football coaching staff. Today's Q&A is with special teams coordinator and outside linebackers coach, Kevin Smith.

Q: How are your players doing during this time?
A: Better than I anticipated, they're being so positive. They wrapped their mind around the situation we have, and what we need to do to get better. They've been awesome about getting creative about ways to improve, which is one of the things we harp on as a program. They've taken it full force and I've been impressed.
 
Q: How has this effected the coaching staff. It's a new staff that came together in early January. How has that relationship gone?
KS: It's been awesome. A lot of us knew each other already and I'm learning a lot from these guys. We're confident enough to call each other to ask questions, bounce ideas, get creative on how we're going to improve and put our players in the best situation to improve.
 
Q: From a special teams coach perspective, it's important to get on the field to practice kickoff, punt, etc., how are you relaying that information to the players?
KS: To me, the biggest hurdle you have to get through with special teams is creating an emphasis and culture on the impact that special teams can have. What I have done is reach out to every player on the team and maintain a relationship with each one. 
 
Q: Being the special teams coach you deal with everyone. Is that one of the nice things of being in your position?
KS: It's awesome. To really dive in and have the broad spectrum with all these kids and having relationships with all of them makes it that much more impactful to being able to help them in their personal development. It's one of my favorite parts of it. Whenever we have workouts or meetings, I bounce from meeting to meeting and talk to the players before the meetings start, and it's one of my favorite parts of the job.
 
Q: How did you become a special teams coordinator?
KS: I was the special teams coordinator at Lock Haven, one of my first full-time jobs, and I think that was more so being an organized person and having an understanding of the impact special teams can have. I spent time at Penn State working on special teams on my own time. That way, if an opportunity did present itself, I felt confident I'd be able to do it at a high level.
 
Q: What are some of the things you learned at Penn State to help you in your coaching development?
KS: That's a question that I can answer for hours. It was an unbelievable experience with guys that I consider to be the best coaches in the country. One of the first things I learned was how strong and important relationships with people need to be. Whether it be player-to-coach, coach-to-player, coach-to-coach, that's one of the things that stuck out to me. Obviously, there's a high level of football knowledge and you find a way to take in as much of that information as possible and make it applicable to your situation to form your coaching style. The final thing is recruiting. Those guys are some of the best recruiters in the country and it circles to how important relationships were to that staff. How important it is to develop relationships is the number one thing I took from Penn State.
 
Q: You were a young guy when you were hired as a full-time coach at Lock Haven. What was the decision like to take the GA position at Penn State?
KS: It was an easy decision from the coaching development. The other thing is being at a Division II school, you understand you have to wear a lot of hats. I was a full-time coach, there were a lot of GA type duties I was involved in. I never had a problem with doing any type of GA job. To me, there are jobs that need to be done and I can do them. It was a no-brainer from a coaching development standpoint.
 
Q: Lock Haven is a challenging place to be at. What was your time there like?
KS: It was challenging, but what it did was it created a mentality that we can't allow difficult situations to determine how we're going to perform. From there it created a mentality for me that you're going to work full speed no matter the cards you were dealt. 
 
Q: You played at Urbana University, you coached there. What was your time there like?
KS: It was certainly interesting. The university is no longer open. To me, it shaped my life for the better just because of the people I was around. It shaped me how I became as a person because of the relationships I had there.
 
Q: I know you've only been here a few months, but what do you think of Norfolk?
KS: It's amazing. The thing that was unbelieve to me was the support for the program. Not just football, but athletics in general. I know there are universities out there that don't have the same support that we do. I've never lived this close to water so from that aspect it's beautiful. I can't wait to continue to explore once we're able to.
 
Q: What is your recruiting style?
KS: It's very personal. I like to grow relationships where it gets to a point where they'll be comfortable to talk to me about anything. From there it turns into a relationship where it's hard for a recruit to say no. I've always taken a very personal approach, and that includes recruiting the family, the coach, all the people that are involved, to the point where they feel comfortable with me.