Over the past 45 years, Jim Britton has been an assistant coach in football, softball, basketball, baseball and track.
Now, after serving as an assistant last year under Tae Brooks, it is Britton’s time to shine as he takes over for his first season as the new head football coach of the Arena League Eau Claire Axemen.
“There’s a lot of responsibility on a head coach,” Britton said. “But, I enjoy it. It’s work, but I’ve done this for so long, and I just love coaching, and I love coaching football.”
The Axemen finished their inaugural season last year 1-7. It was a year filled with tumultuous ownership changes, disappointing results and ultimately a coaching change, as Britton took over from Brooks last November.
Also new this year are offensive coordinator Harrison Tsimouris, who also serves as UW-Eau Claire running backs coach, and defensive coordinator MJ Johnson.
With changes hopefully behind them, Britton hopes the Axemen can solely focus on football, especially when they hit the Sonnentag Center field for their home opener against the Arkansas Diamonds on Saturday.
“We have three pillars: faith, family and love,” Britton said. “Before every practice, after every practice, before and after games, (I tell them that) I love them and I love them for the hard work that they put in.”
The Eau Claire community will look to lift the spirits of the Axemen at the Sonnentag Center this summer. In their final game last year, they had 1,400 fans in attendance.
“I’m super excited to showcase our players to Eau Claire, and hopefully these guys can make inroads in the community,” Britton said. “We just want to put the best product on the field we can, and we have to be good character people.”
The Axemen lost 48-32 in its opening game this season to the Ozark Lumbers last Saturday in Springfield, Missouri.
“We scored on the very first play of the game, and then we had four or five possessions inside the five,” Britton said. “It always comes down to your execution, and we just didn’t execute well enough.”
The loss was made worse by a dislocated kneecap to wideout Matt Laur.
“Our guys just absolutely love Matt, and so that was a big blow,” Britton said.
Still though, Britton is excited for what his team and this season has in store.
“We have a mixture of young rookies, some tenured players, and some older players,” Britton said. “The guys we have in that locker room are quality and very talented. We came out on the short end of the stick.
“One of my messages is, ‘If we win, we win. If we lose, we learn.’ So, that’s what we try to do and we’re going to improve, we’re going to get better.”
