Know your Trojan coach: Shayne Wasden

TROY - Shayne Wasden is in his fifth year with the Trojans after being hired from Eufaula High School, where he was head coach prior to the 2004 season. Wasden, the special teams coach and outside receivers coach, was promoted to assistant head coach in the offseason.

How did you get to Troy?
I’ve always wanted to coach at the college level. Coach (Larry) Blakeney was my position coach at Auburn and I stayed in touch with him throughout the years. I told him if he ever had a job that he thought would be a good fit for me to give me a call. Coach (Mike) Turk left for Huntington which opened up a receiver coach spot and he gave me a chance to be a part of his staff.

Biggest differences between college and high school?
Recruiting. You don’t recruit in high school. That’s the biggest adjustment, and less time at home. Those are the two things that are the biggest difference.

So in that sense it’s better to have daughters (ages 14 and 10)?
They’re very supportive and having two girls is probably than having two boys in being a college coach because mom can handle discipline better with girls than she could with boys. It’s worked out good and been a good four-plus years so far.

Most memorable coaching moment?
Without out a doubt it’s the Middle Tennessee game (2006). You can coach a lifetime and never coach in a game like that where we had to have so many things go right for us. We were down 20-7 with two minutes to go. We had to score a touchdown, get an onside kick, go down and score again and get an extra point to win it.

How much as a coach can you take credit for that execution?
We work on that stuff every week. Coaches, all you can do is coach them and teach them what to do. They’re the ones that have to go out and perform and make the plays. Our guys did a great job executing and getting on the football.

Greg Whibbs did a great job of kicking the ball a little deeper than you normally would. It got beyond their front line and they weren’t able to get to it until we got there. You never know for sure until you see the official point your direction. When I saw that, it was exciting, but we still had to go on and score. That was an exciting coaching moment.

Most embarrassing coaching moment?
It probably happened on more than one occasion, but getting on to a player for something they did wrong and later finding out that they weren’t guilty or didn’t do it. I know I’ve done that more than once. That would be embarrassing to me and it’s happened.

Most heartbreaking coaching moment?
It would be hard to top (LSU this year). That one’s definitely a tough one and when I was at Opp, we were in the second round of the playoffs playing Shelby County. They threw three deep balls and caught them on us and scored with a few seconds left, went for two and got it. It was disappointing because we wanted to go to the next round of the playoffs, but the one Saturday night would be hard to top. They were a really good team, really athletic, great players.

What got you into coaching?
My dad coached, my mom taught their whole careers. The impact they had on young people, I wanted to have the same impact and influence on young people that they had. It’s rewarding and difficult at the same time, but I would be hard-pressed to find a profession where you deal with young people as much as we do.

Future goals?
I’d like to be a head coach. I was a head coach in high school and hopefully I can be one at the college level.