Denver Broncos high school football coach of the week: Walsh’s Bill Forgey
Bill Forgey just sounds like a man who means business. He initially got thrown into the coaching ranks when a middle school wrestling coach was needed and he hasn’t looked back since.
Now prowling the sidelines for Walsh’s football program, Forgey is hoping to lead his team to a winning season. Despite dropping the first game of the year he steered the team back on path with a 16-12 win over Branson/Kim last week.
That win was good enough to make to him the Denver Broncos high school football coach of the week.
The Broncos coach of the week is selected in partnership with the Broncos. Find a complete list of winners on this page.
Bill Forgey bio
Years as head coach: 5 (13-23)
Years at Walsh: 5 (1-1 this season)
Previous stops: Walsh assistant coach 2011-15; Walsh head coach (2016-present).
Question: Why did you get into coaching?
Forgey: It started with wrestling. I wrestled and played football in school. And then (Walsh) was needing a junior high wrestling coach. So I stepped up there and then our high school coaches left and I took over that. My kids all graduated, the last one graduated in 2013 and I was going to give it up, but nobody stepped up to take over. And then with football, I just enjoy working with the kids and basically what it is.
Q: What do you think it’s like to be coached by you?
Forgey: I’m not sure how to answer that one. The kids seem to keep coming back out for me. I mean, we didn’t have an abundance of kids last year. We had seven kids playing six man football and played four games with six kids. They seem to enjoy it.
Q: With the unusual circumstances surrounding this season, how quickly when the option came up were you guys aware that you were going to choose to play in Season A?
Forgey: I was wanting to play in Season A because we’d already decided that you don’t want to play spring football out here on the plains. When you get into the spring, you get those hard, just bitter cold winds. I’d rather be inside wrestling at that time.
Q: What is it about the 6-man game that you enjoy the most?
Forgey: It’s hard. Honestly, I’d rather play 8-man, but the 6-man games give the smaller schools a chance to keep their programs. Our first year with 6-man, we were undefeated until we met Eads and we forgot the center was eligible and their center just killed us.
It’s just about learning different things. The quarterback, the first person to touch the ball, can’t run across the line of scrimmage. It’s hard to break kids in right after you’ve just come down from 8-man, but it’s a wide open game. I’m still learning.
Q: Is it safe to say it was a big adjustment for you as well as the kids?
Forgey: Oh yeah. The one-on-one tackling is you have to be good at it and because if you’re not, you get a lot of points scored on you.
Q: How important was it for this year for you guys to go out and get that first win against Branson/Kim?
Forgey: That was a big one. When we went to Mountain Valley, we didn’t play bad, but we had 12 penalties for 95 yards and we had one or two touchdowns called back. At the end of the three, they were up on us 19-8, but we were still in the game and then the fourth quarter just kind of fell apart on us. Our offense hasn’t been clicking very good.
Against Branson/Kim, they were up 12-0 on us going into the fourth and our offense finally started clicking some and we scored two (touchdowns) with our extra points and the defense played excellent. I’m starting three freshmen, two seniors and one junior and my freshmen are starting to pick it up and they’re doing a good job. All of them have done a good job.
Q: How challenging is that when half of your team is made up of kids who hadn’t seen the varsity level before?
Forgey: You know what, the freshmen I have now, I have six total on the team, but I’ve had them since fifth grade playing junior high football. They progress, but it’s a big step from junior high to high school, even though you played that game.
They’re just trying to figure it out. They’ve finally grown some and they’re figuring out their footwork and stuff like that. They’re coming along well.
Q: In this shortened season, what’s your measurement of success for this team?
Forgey: We haven’t had very many winning seasons since after our first year of 6-man. We’re just taking it one game at a time. We have Cheraw this week and right now they’re undefeated. So that’s another big game and we have some tough games coming up here, so they’re going to have to step up.
I think it’s going to be tough for us to make the playoffs because that league up north with Stratton/Liberty, Eads, Cheyenne Wells and all those teams, that’s a pretty tough league. But I’d like to have a winning record by the end of the season.
