New head coach aims to break Barrier to success
New head coach looks to improve footballs teams skills.
Photo: Jaquelyn Rebollar
Head Coach Ned Barrier during football practice Wednesday, Sept. 11. He took over for Steve Svendsen at the end of the 2018-2019 school year.
Sep 12, 2019
Committed.
New head coach and athletic director Nathan Barrier has dedicated his life to football.
Barrier has had several offensive coordinator jobs before starting his career as a head coach for the past four years. He moved in this area from Wallis Brazos High School to be closer to family.
“Conroe ISD is different because there are multiple schools and multiple athletic directors and coaches,” Barrier said. “There are more people to call and ask there is a lot more help from school to school than my old school because it was just a single high school. The administration … is so much more helpful here it’s good to be apart of CISD.”
When moving Barrier’s daughter, senior Macy Barrier was looking forward to coming to Caney Creek High School.
Head Coach Ned Barrier stands for the National Anthem during the Lake Creek football game at the Montgomery ISD football stadium on Aug. 30.
“The high school we were at didn’t have a college thing for her, so she was just having to take classes that meant nothing,” Barrier said. “Moving to Caney Creek allowed her to go to Lone Star College and start taking her early college classes that she was set up for so she is really excited about getting the opportunity to go ahead in her senior year start taking college classes and get college hours and really setting her up for her first year of college.”
Barrier is not worried about where the football team is at, he is focused on improving his team.
“When you start off you are at point A. Everyday when we go out to practice we want to get a little bit better,” Barrier said. “When you look back from the end of the season back to the beginning, you watch tape and hope to say, ‘Man we are so much better now than we were then, we play better we are in better shape.’ That’s what we are looking for at the end of the season.”
Barrier’s plans are to practice hard and get better.
Head Coach Ned Barrier celebrates after the Panthers scored a touchdown late in the third quarter.
“We focus on certain things to work on to better,” Barrier said.“Everyday we got to work on our condition and playing both sides of the ball,” Barrier said. “Each day we go out with a plan trying to figure out what to do to get better. Looking watching films from previous games and see what mistakes we are making and try to fix them.”
Barrier arrived at the end of last school year. He was focused on just learning everyone’s name and figuring out who people on the football team was.
“When I got here it was the last week of school and some of them were exempt from finals, so I didn’t really meet everybody until August,” Barrier said.
The athletic director is responsible for all aspects of the program including coaches from varsity all the way down to freshmen for every sport.
Head Coach Ned Barrier talks with the players and coaches after the loss to the Lake Creek Lions on Aug. 30. He told the players and coaches that it was OK to be disappointed and “even a little upset,” but that they all know they have “stuff to work on to get better.” All of the players and coaches nodded in agreement and said, “Yes sir” before getting up and hustling to the locker room.
“The big thing we are trying to do is get as many kids to play as many sports as possible,” Barrier said. “We want multi-sport athletes we are trying to utilize as many kids as we have. The second thing we are wanting to is a great off season when we are not in sports as far as weightlifting, conditioning, speed and agility type things, and getting all the kids better at that and moving from sport to sport being able to utilize all of our time.”
