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... "That was pretty cool for most coaches in America," said Gary Rankin, the head football coach at Boyd Buchanan School, a private high school in Chattanooga, Tenn. "Regardless of one's politics, this is exciting for a lot of us."

Joe Aresimowicz, the head football coach at Berlin High School in Berlin, Conn., said he quickly learned what he could about Walz, including that he had helped the Mankato West High School Scarlets football team go from a winless streak to the 1999 Minnesota state championship.

"It all started to fit," said Aresimowicz, a former Democratic speaker of the Connecticut house of representatives. "Coaching and politics are one and the same in a lot of areas."

Many coaches saw an inspirational moment at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago as 15 former football players at Mankato West took the stage in a tribute to their former assistant coach.

Rankin, the winningest high school football coach in Tennessee history, was inducted this year into the hall of fame of the National Federation of State High School Associations, the Indianapolis-based rule-setting body for secondary school activities.

Football coaching is about building relationships"with players, other coaches, and the community, he said.

"I'm sure it's the same way when you get into politics," Rankin said. "There are teams around you whether you are a congressman, the vice president, or the president." ...

The quality of coaching matters, research shows ...

Dreams...

A song along those lines, a version you never hear on the radio...

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... Gould has conducted some of that research. In a 2007 study by Gould and three other academics, the researchers found that the best high school football coaches did not separate their efforts to promote winning from tactics to impart life skills to their players.

Those skills include academic focus, setting goals, discipline, avoiding taunting or "trash talking," and stressing achievement, among others.

"What was especially impressive with these coaches was the consistency with which they implemented these strategies," the study said. "Looking across all coaches, it was clear that the players knew what was expected of them and that they would be held accountable for meeting those expectations."

A more recent study by Gould and others, not yet published, involved interviewing a sample of former high school athletes 50 years after graduation. The study concludes that the athletes all had meaningful experiences that stuck with them and contributed to their development as successful adults. ...