Auburndale football rebuilds under new head coach

MARSHFIELD – The Auburndale High School football program is under new leadership, although players and fans know him well.

Brandon Roberson has been coaching in Auburndale since 2014 and joined the varsity staff in 2017.

“Jay [Anderson] had stepped down, so somebody had to step up and fill in the role,” Roberson told Hub City Times, as he began preparing for the upcoming season. “I was the most familiar with most of the students and the coaching and there was a lot of turnover. A lot of the old guard, their kids are graduating and they want to enjoy their latter years with their grandkids. My kids are still young, so I’ll be around for a while. Why not give it a shot?”

Coaching is not something Roberson necessarily wanted to do.

“I’ve always been a player,” he said. “I’ve never been the guy that was going to be making the game plan or anything like that. After I got hurt playing football is when I switched to coaching and I enjoyed it, so I just stayed with it.”

Roberson graduated from Milwaukee Lutheran, where he played offensive tackle and tight end. After high school, he walked on at UW-Whitewater, but never played for the Warhawks. Roberson then enjoyed a short semi-pro career, during which he won a championship. After an injury ended his playing career, Roberson got into coaching.

“We ended up moving up by Auburndale and ended up with my little brother after my dad passed,” Roberson shared. “He wanted to play football, and not knowing the area, I wanted to make sure he got a fair shot. But it wasn’t just going to be, ‘I’m going to coach my kid and give my kid a fair shot.’ I just don’t coach like that. I never have. When I coached my little brother from the time he was in fifth grade all the way through varsity, if he messed up I’d bench him. It was always the other coaches that put him back in.

“I like when that light bulb turns on on a kid,” Roberson shared, when asked what he likes most about coaching. “When you say it a thousand times [and] they don’t get it, and then you finally say it in a way that they understand and they start to get it, seeing that moment is what’s worth it when you’re coaching.”

The cupboards in Auburndale are not totally bare, but Roberson does take over an Auburndale football program that is made up of mostly underclassmen.

“We were very senior-heavy last year,” Roberson told us. “Right now we only have four seniors that played significant minutes last year. Everybody else is coming off of JV.”

The four key returners include Carter Grassl, who played defensive end. Russ Teska played middle linebacker on defense and guard on offense. Will Akins is back as a go-to wide receiver. Ray Teska is also a returning wide receiver and part-time running back.

Roberson says the rest of the puzzle is a work in progress.

“I haven’t gotten the full picture of the roster yet,” he told us on July 30. “We’d like a couple kids, like a Connor Johnson, to step up. He’s a very athletic kid we’d like to put into a couple positions.

“We have Alex Becker. He played a couple minutes on varsity last year, but he didn’t have significant playing time. And Aiden Lendved, him and Alex are really good defensive tackles. It’s hard to replace two first-team All-Conference guys, so we’ll see what happens.

Roberson expects Grassl and Beck Dammann to compete for the quarterback spot.

“Carter played a little bit at quarterback on JV already and Beck is just… he has the tools. We’ll see how his body is once we get into [practice]. He has a really good knowledge of the game.”

Roberson expects Brennen Welch, Ray Teska and Max Krings to compete for time at the running back position.

Cooper Weinfurter is back as the team’s offensive coordinator. Fletcher Raab returns to coach returners and special teams. Matt Seevers is also back as a varsity assistant. 

New to the team this season is defensive assistant Noah Barrett, a Stratford graduate who played collegiately at St. Olaf College (MN) and who just finished his first professional football season with the Northern Arizona Wranglers of the Indoor Football League.

“I just want to be able to compete,” Roberson said. “I don’t want to go in there thinking that we’re just going to walk over anybody. I want to give all of our opponents respect, but at the same point have enough confidence in ourselves knowing that we can play with anybody.”

Roberson has nine seniors coming into this season, and he expects at least six of them to get significant playing time.

Aside from those already mentioned, the team’s seniors include Truxton Becker, Kyle Bohman, Devin Cherney, Davin Snodie and Taylor Turner.

Besides Alex Becker, Johnson, Lendved and Welch, this year’s juniors are Tyden Dorshorst, Andrew Hasenohrl, Gavin Kayhart, Tayt Smith, Carson Weiler and Mason Willfahrt.

Joining Dammann and Max Krings are remaining sophomores Isaac Aschenbrenner, Andrew Brandl, Thomas Grzesiak, Thomas Krings, Tucker Kundinger and Jaxon Skoug.

This year’s freshman class includes Blake Graf, Jacob Matticks, Madden Meissner, Landry Nagel, Devin Novotny, Ayden Pilsner, Jackson Plemon, Ryan Schreiber, Jackson Seidl, Teyvin Smith, Noah Wellach and Bentley Wiskerchen.

The Eagles open their season Aug. 21 at Spencer-Columbus, followed by a home game on Aug. 28 versus Marathon. Auburndale will host Loyal/Greenwood on Sept. 4 to start their conference schedule.