Q&A with Old Rochester coach Justin Kogler

MIAA Division 6 is deep this year with quality teams, and right now our rankings have Old Rochester at the top of the heap.

Before the season, we spoke to Bulldogs coach Justin Kogler, who told us about the experience he brought back, so we had a good idea of what this team was capable of.

We reached out Tuesday afternoon to speak with Kogler again about his 5-0 team as it heads into the home stretch of the regular season.

Here is an edited version of that conversation.

MassVarsity: We talked a few months ago about your team and how you had a lot of experience back. You guys are obviously playing well. What have you noticed about how you guys have played so far, and what you're doing right that has given you such a boost here?

JK: I think, I just got finished going over the stats, our stats so far this year, and I compared them to last year, and it's amazing how much more balanced we are across the board. Last year at this time, we had one kid that was about 800 yards or 700 yards rushing, and then we had another kid who was at about 600 or 700 yards rushing. But now, this year, we have a bunch of kids, a ton of kids who are at 200 and 300 yards rushing. Last year, everyone kind of just focused on one or two guys. We have more depth this year.

MV: Who are those guys that are having success running the ball for you?

JK: First of all, we have Desmond Dias, who is doing a great job at fullback. Our starting tailback, Will Garcia, who rushed for 1,400 yards last year and 21 touchdowns, he's out for the season. We lost him in the third game of the year. But Jackson Cote came in, he ran for 140 yards against Somerset Berkley, and the week before he had 80 against Dighton-Rehoboth. So he stepped in and did a nice job. Anthony Childs is averaging 13 yards a carry. He's a converted wide receiver. We use him on jet sweep kind of stuff. And then Tyler Noe, he's also carrying the ball a little bit, and he has five receiving touchdowns. My quarterback, Cole McIntyre, is also doing a nice job.

MV: What about up front? How do you look there? Are you senior-laden there, or is it more of a mix?

JK: We're mixed. We have three seniors starting up front and two juniors. But we also have one other junior that rotates in on the offensive line. So, basically, we're playing three seniors and three juniors up front, and our whole defensive line is juniors.

MV: I've looked at some of your film, and another thing we talked about over the summer were some of your linebackers. I look at your linebackers, and I see a group that's as good as almost anybody in the state. Do you feel like you've got a pretty good group there?

JK: Yeah, I feel like this is the best group of linebackers I've ever had, by far. It's just that, collectively, as a group, they're pretty good. And we haven't been playing with the kid that led our team in tackles last year. He's been out for the season. He'll be back not this week, but the following week. His name's Cam Brezinski. He's 6-foot-3, 205 pounds. He plays outside linebacker for us. He'll be back. So we're playing without him, as well. So once he comes back into the fold, our linebackers are probably as good as anybody.

MV: Can you tell me a little bit about Dylan DeWolfe? He's somebody that looks really tough out there.

JK: Yeah, he's a big, physical kid. He's 230 pounds. He's very difficult to move. He is a very good tackler, especially in tight quarters. When he hits you in the hole, you usually don't get too much more after he hits you. He's very good at reading run plays and pass plays. He's gotten so much better, even from the beginning of the year. He's only a junior, so hopefully he continues to progress.

MV: You've had a lot of non-competitive wins. You had a close game, I guess your only close game, against Dighton-Rehoboth two weeks ago, in a 20-14 win. How do you feel your kids responded? In a game like that, sometimes it can be tough when you're blowing everybody out, and then when you get one close game, things break down.

JK: Overall, I was happy with how I responded. We had too many penalties in that game. Some of the penalties were OK penalties, penalties I was OK with. It was just being aggressive, kind of. But we had some stupid penalties that we definitely have to clean up. Last week, we only had I think one penalty against Somerset. That was good. But I was happy with how we responded against D-R. They are a very good team. They defend us, I mean every year, they defend us better than anybody else. So I knew that was going to be a difficult game, and it was. But the kids just kept battling. We went up early, 14-0. We scored two, and then they went 14 unanswered points. And then on that last drive when we had to, we went 70 yards in five plays and scored. So I was happy with how we responded when we had to.

MV: Now you guys are undefeated with playoff seeding and everything like that coming up. How do you feel you guys are rounding into form heading into the second half of the season?

JK: I think as long as we can stay healthy, which, knock on wood, right now we're fairly healthy with the exception of Garcia. We get Brezinski back, so that's going to be huge. As long as we stay healthy and approach every week just to get better in practice, and keep working and not kind of get comfortable where we're at, I think we've got a shot against anyone we play. I think there are some really good teams in Division 6 South, and it's going to be difficult to get through. But if we play 

disciplined football, and we play defense and tackle, and block people up front, we can play with anybody.