With the regular football season over, it’s only fair to talk about the coach and son duo, Jake and Braden Wakey. Carterville High School senior Braden Wakey has played football all 4 years, but during his freshman year, he didn’t have a freshman season due to COVID-19, and now he has just finished his last year of football with his dad right by his side.

Some people may think that it would be easier for Coach Wakey to coach his son, but he would disagree. When asked if it was easier or harder coaching Braden because he was his son, Coach said, “Harder for sure, because my expectations were unfairly higher and it made it difficult.”

In response, Braden said, “During my first three years playing for him [my dad], I was only coached by him on special teams. In my junior year, I was the punter throughout the season and was nominated as an All-Conference punter. My success resulted from him pushing me to be the best I could be in practice and during the games. This year, I was moved to an edge rusher which was a big change from playing corner back my junior year. Moving to edge meant I would be playing at the position my father coached.  I didn’t know how I would make the change to a new position; however, my father drove me to be the player I was defensively throughout this year. ”

Combining parenting and coaching can be a challenging endeavor to take on. Coach said, “I don’t know what I would do differently but there were probably things I should’ve done differently, I just hope he realizes it’s not easy for me or for him.”

With that, added expectations and pressure can sometimes be found in children of coaches.  Braden said, “I would say overall it was a bit more difficult having him be my coach, not so much my junior year but more my senior year, because he coached my position this year. It was a tad challenging because if I made a mistake most time, we would argue about what I did. Also at practice, he expected a lot out of our defensive line as a unit, which led to strict rules about our technique. However, I would not change anything about how things played out. I became the player I was because of having him coach me.”