Southeast’s trip to Lennard pits former Seminole teammates against each other

More than two years ago, when Matt Kitchie was struggling to pick up victories on the sidelines at Tampa Leto, the head coach decided to come back to his roots. It was 2015 the first time the former Southeast quarterback brought one of his teams back to his alma mater. Kitchie lined Leto up for a two-year agreement to play preseason classics against the Seminoles back when Daniel Bradshaw, who overlapped with Kitchie as an assistant coach for the Noles, was athletic director.

In January, Kitchie changed jobs. Despite a rocky tenure in Tampa, Kitchie was offered the job at Ruskin Lennard and is now set to begin his first season at the new job. There wasn’t a ton of time to put a schedule together, but there was one priority — another date with Southeast.

“I think he really enjoys getting the chance to come back here because he played here, he went to school here and I think he likes to bring his kids here from whatever school he’s at,” Seminoles head coach Rashad West, “just talk to them about the history of this place and where he’s from.”

So for the third straight preseason, Kitchie will coach against the team which molded him, although it won’t be in the anticipated location. Lennard will host the Noles on Friday at 7:30 p.m. in Ruskin, the game forced to move from Paul Maechtle Field at Kiker Stadium because of a sodding issue.

For Kitchie it’s an opportunity to reflect on how he became the sort of coach he is. Maechtle, the legendary Southeast head coach, is one of Kitchie’s most important mentors and helped mold him into a coach able to land a job with the Longhorns even after a bizarre six seasons at Leto.

Kitchie’s record with Leto — an agonizing 3-57 — suggests a disaster. At one point during his tenure, Kitchie said, Leto had the longest losing streak in the nation. Yet, after a 1-9 final season with, his fellow coaches in Hillsborough County voted him the county’s coach of the year. Lennard, which won seven games in 2015 before falling back to 2-8 last year, thought highly enough to trust Kitchie to lead its program.

He’s been successful before. He spent three seasons with Land O’ Lakes before his involvement in a player’s off-the-field incident led to his firing after a 17-3 tenure. Before Kitchie’s time with the Gators, Saint Stephen’s tabbed the local to be the first head coach of its rebooted program. The new team went 5-5 during both of Kitchie’s seasons as a head coach in Bradenton.

“I’m very excited to be at Lennard. For the past six years I was at Leto High School and that had its own set of challenges,” Kitchie said. “It wasn’t a lack of trying. ... Leto was a great learning experience for me even though we didn’t have success. I worked very hard. I made sure the kids were always prepared. I feel like we went into every game with an opportunity to do something.”

When the wins were rare, Maechtle’s philosophies echoed through his head. Success was never solely measured by winning or losing games, but by progress. Kitchie said anyone who stops by his practices and is familiar with Maechtle would be struck by the similarities. Kitchie tries to mimic everything, down to some of the sayings Maechtle would use.

On the opposite sideline Friday will be another product of the Maechtle coaching tree. Kitchie and West overlapped during for three seasons from 1993-1995 when both were playing quarterback for the Maechtle-coached Noles. Their paths diverged from there — Kitchie went on to play at Division II Newberry College in South Carolina before returning to coach in the Tampa Bay area; West played for Southeast Missouri State then spent time coaching in South Florida — but they’ve remained close friends since their Southeast days. This year, Kitchie celebrated Independence Day at West’s home.

There’s a lesson there, too, Kitchie says. From Day 1 of his first fall season with Ruskin, the new head coach will have a chance to be a teacher.

“For me, it’s a special thing,” Kitchie said. “I want to beat them more than anyone else. Saying that, I think the best part of this is it’s a great teaching thing for my kids, at least, in that Rashad and I are still close friends, we hang out, we talk often, but we both want to beat each other very badly.

“I just think this is what competition really is about and I think it’s a great teaching lesson for today’s kids to see that you can compete with your friends and then still be friends.”

This story was originally published August 16, 2017 at 5:54 PM with the headline "Southeast’s trip to Lennard pits former Seminole teammates against each other."