By Kevin Eckleberry

Sports Editor

Charles Flowers has felt right at home the past two weeks roaming the football practice field at Troup High.

Flowers is the new head football coach at Troup, and he guided the Tigers through their spring-practice period that ended Thursday with a full-contact scrimmage.

Although Flowers is in his first year as the team’s head coach, he is not a newcomer to Troup High.

He’s a 1975 graduate of Troup, and the chance to return to his old school is the reason he’s here.

So far, the experience has been everything he hoped it would be.

“Everybody’s been very helpful. Everybody’s been very supportive,” Flowers said this week. “It’s a good family atmosphere out there. That helps a lot. I’m enjoying it.”

These past two weeks offered Flowers his first chance to see what his new players can do.

Flowers, who was the long-time coach at Shaw before spending the past three seasons heading the program at Dougherty, likes what he’s seen.

“The kids work hard,” he said. “They know how to work. They’ve gotten after it pretty good.”

Flowers takes over a program that has been to the state playoffs nine of the previous 10 seasons.

Bubba Jeter stepped down as the Troup coach following the 2010 season, clearing the way for Flowers.

“My biggest thing is, we’re not trying to revamp Troup High football, we’re just trying to make some adjustments,” he said. “They’ve done some good things over the years. Coach Jeter’s done a good job with them and the other coaches on the staff. We’re just trying to add to it a little bit.”

Flowers brings a tremendous resume to his new job.

He has a career record of 145-75 in 19 seasons as a head coach, with most of those wins coming at Shaw where he turned that program into one of the state’s best.

Flowers’ Raiders won a state championship in 2000, and they were perennial contenders for about a decade.

When Flowers left, the Raiders had won at least 10 games for seven straight years.

Flowers’ staff will include several new coaches, as well as a number of holdovers from last year’s staff.

Flowers said these past two weeks have been critical as everyone gets to know each other.

“(Spring practice is) tremendously important, because it sets the tone going into the summer,” he said. “Everybody kind of understands the coaches, and it helps us getting to know the players and learning expectations.

“The biggest thing is the players getting to know each other, trying to create some team camaraderie.”

With a new coaching staff comes changes, and Flowers said there has been a lot of “teaching” the past two weeks.

“The offense and defense are doing a lot of things differently, so there’s been a lot of fundamentals,” he said.

Flowers was hired about three months ago, and although he remained at his teaching position at Dougherty, he has been able to spend some time at Troup.

“I’ve tried to get up once a week and meet with them,” he said. “That’s been good.”

There is nothing like being on the field with whistle in hand, though.

“I’m excited,” he said. “It’s great to have an opportunity to get out here, get after it and get going and just think positively. That’s the big thing.”

Troup opens its season Aug. 27 against Callaway