Come fall, Fridays will once again house the Holy viewing ritual of high school football. But at The South End, starting today, Fridays mean Wayne State football. As the Warriors prepare to shrug off an NCAA playoff snub after a record 9-2 season, we’ll be bringing you coach and player features and the latest news leading up to, and continuing through, the 2011 regular season.

First up is a sit-down conversation with WSU football’s head-of-state, head coach Paul Winters.

With seven years already in the books and after ending this past season with a 9-2 overall record, coach Paul Winters has already made his mark as one of Wayne States greatest football coaches in school history.

Success of such magnitude doesn’t start with a decision to put forth effort. It starts with a kid who decided at an early age that football was a love worth pursuing.

“I ran track and actually coached it for a year in college, but football was just something that was always a passion for me,” Winters said. “From the time growing up, my dad took me to see the Cleveland Browns play the Green Bay Packers — I was eight or nine then. I loved football from that point on.”

This past season, Winters led the Warriors to one of their best seasons in school history setting records in overall wins (9), conference wins (8), points in a season (347), yards per pass attempt (7.67) and passing completion percentage (59.9).

Accomplishments such as these come with challenges and require perseverance.

Wayne State as a university allows Winters to grow his team and prepare them for the road ahead, on and off the field.

“It’s a great university” Winters said.“It offers me the opportunity to sit down with a player’s family and tell them that I can offer them a great education. That’s a big positive.”

After a great season, some might think Winters would feel that way too, but that’s what makes a great coach: not settling for record highs.

“Not making the playoffs left me unsatisfied because I felt that we had a team that could compete on a national level” Winters said.” I was very happy with the results of the season, winning nine games and being the GLIAC South champs but I think we can accomplish a lot more. We have a group of young men who work very hard, care about each other, care about we we’re trying to do in the program, and really do things the right way. I think the sky’s the limit for what we can accomplish in the future; I’ve got good leaders, good talent, and guys that care so I’m pretty happy with that.”

Injuries were a big factor throughout this past season, Winters said. New strength coach Ruben Mendoza will bring a new dynamic to the team and will help lower the frequency of injury.

“You look at last year and we were unfortunate with injuries,” Winters said. “We had a lot of major injuries and we would like to eliminate some of that. We even had some minor injuries at the beginning of the year. Some hamstrings and things from overtraining. We’re going to try to get the guys focused on stretching and doing other things to avoid injuries.”

Mendoza played for the Green Bay Packers in the 1986 season and served as Coordinator of Strength and Conditioning for the University of Tennessee and the University of Notre Dame; he was also Assistant Director of Strength and Conditioning at Clemson University and Director of Strength and Conditioning at the University of Mississippi.

“Mendoza’s bringing a new program with what he does” Winters said. “I’m very excited to see how our kids respond.”

Winters said a key difference this upcoming season that will aid the team is the experience of junior quarterback Mickey Mohner.

“The experience that all of our quarterbacks have with the offense will make a difference with how we perform on offense” Winters said. “Also defensively we’ve got so many players back I think we’ll be able to eliminate some of those minimal mistakes that cost us.”

Winters and the rest of the coaching staff rely on their “PMA” philosophy when keeping their players in the right mindset.

“Positive mental attitude, we talk about that all the time” Winters said. “We start with setting goals and talk about overcoming obstacles and adversity. We stress that everyone has the ability to have success. That kind of goes throughout everything we talk about.”

Senior linebacker Zachary Easterly said he appreciates what Winters does for the team and acknowledges PMA as a great mindset.

“Winters will to win is a trait that rubs off on the team” Easterly said. “Our team is always about PMA.”

Winters said he looks forward to a great season with an incoming freshman class that will add great depth to the team, he added he hopes to see more students present and enjoying some of the enjoyment he experiences during the game.

“The atmosphere at the games are fun” Winters said. “The fact is, we’re winning football games so you’re going to get excited. There’s a lot to be proud of here.”