Special Teams Before the Storm: Winning Hidden Yardage in July

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The full text of “Special Teams Before the Storm: Winning Hidden Yardage in July”, from the Vol 2 — Summer 2026 issue.

Special Teams B Special Teams B Winning hidden yardage in July BY AFQ STAFF Every coach says special teams matter. Then July comes, and special teams get squeezed. The offense needs install time, the defense needs pursuit work, the weight room needs

31 efore the Storm efore the Storm attention, the staff wants more team reps and the players want competition. So special teams get pushed back—a little punt work here, a little PAT there, a few kickoff reps when time allows. Then Week One arrives, and the staff is shocked when the punt team is late, the return unit is confused, the backup wing does not know he is on the field and the opponent steals 30 yards without running an offensive play.

That is not bad luck. That is poor preparation. Special teams cannot be something to clean up later, because later is when games are lost. July is when special teams get organized. The teams that treat special teams as a July priority steal games in September. SPECIAL TEAMS ARE NOT EXTRA Special teams are not separate from a program’s identity. They reveal effort, toughness, attention to detail and coaching organization, and they reveal whether players value roles that come without headlines.

At the high school level they swing games quickly. A bad snap changes momentum. A poor punt gives away field position. A missed PAT changes strategy. A kickoff return flips the game. A substitution mistake burns a timeout, and a penalty wipes out hidden yardage. These are not small things. They are winning and losing things. If special teams matter on Friday, they have to matter in July. START WITH PERSONNEL Before the staff draws schemes, it needs people. Who are the best coverage players?

Who can tackle in space, who can protect and who can handle pressure? Who can catch a punt, who can communicate and who is reliable enough to be on the field when chaos happens? Special teams personnel should not be leftovers. Too many programs build offense and defense first and fill special teams with whoever is available, and that is backward.

Special teams need starters, backups and emergency answers, so build a special teams depth chart the way you build an offensive or defensive one—punt, punt return, kickoff, kickoff return, PAT/field goal, PAT/field goal block. Every unit needs names, and every name needs a backup. If a player is important enough to be on special teams, the role is important enough to be coached. THE BACKUP SPECIALIST PLAN Every staff knows who the kicker is. But who is the emergency kicker? Every staff knows the long snapper.

Who is next? Who is the backup holder, who can punt if the starter gets hurt, who can catch a snap if the holder is unavailable, who can step in at wing, who can replace the personal protector and who communicates the count? These questions feel small until they become urgent. Then they become everything. The backup specialist plan does not need to be complicated. It needs to exist.

Give backups reps every week—let them snap, hold, kick, punt and operate under pressure— and make them part of the plan before the plan needs them. The worst time to discover you do not have a backup holder is after the starter gets hurt.

Post this in the staff room and update it every week. If a cell is blank in July, it will be blank in Week Six. Role Starter Backup Emergency Reps this week Kicker Punter Long snapper Holder Personal protector Punt wings Gunners Punt returner Kickoff returner Kickoff safety PUNT PROTECTION FIRST If a staff has time to fully clean up only one unit early, start with punt protection.

A blocked punt can destroy a game, and punt is not just a kicking play—it is protection, communication, spacing, timing, coverage and field position. Players have to know who counts the box and who makes the call, who protects inside-out, who releases and who covers, what happens against pressure, what happens on a poor snap and what happens if the punt is blocked or tipped. Do not assume players understand the stress of punt team. Practice it.

Create pressure looks, move players around, force communication, make the unit count and make it identify threats. Punt protection is not a place for casual coaching. A punt team without communication is a turnover waiting to happen. COVERAGE LANES ARE CULTURE Kickoff and punt coverage show what kind of team you have. They require players to run fast, stay disciplined, defeat blocks, keep leverage and tackle in space—that is football culture.

Build coverage into July work: lane integrity, block destruction, leverage tackling, squeeze-and-spill rules, vise technique on gunners, open-field tracking and finishing to the ball. The key is not effort but disciplined effort. A player running hard in the wrong lane is still wrong. Coverage units have to understand the difference between speed and control.

RETURN RULES MUST BE SIMPLE Return units need clarity, especially early. Who catches the ball? When do we fair catch, and when do we let it go? Where is the communication coming from? What is the rule near the goal line and near the sideline? Who handles a short kick, and who calls poison? Return mistakes usually come from uncertainty, and uncertainty comes from rules that were never made clear. Simplify return communication in July.

Players should not be sorting through five possibilities while the ball is in the air. They should know the rule, then play fast. BUILD A SPECIAL TEAMS ALERT SYSTEM Special teams mistakes often happen because the unit is surprised. The offense stalls and the punt team scrambles. The defense gets a stop and punt return cannot find the returner. A long run sets up a PAT and the unit is late. A turnover creates a sudden field goal situation and no one is ready.

The answer is an alert system: when certain situations appear, the next possible unit gets ready—and that gets practiced in July, not discovered in September. Special teams should never be a sideline fire drill. A starting point. Adjust the triggers to your scheme and your field.

Game situation Unit on alert Offense crosses midfield Punt and field goal Offense enters the red zone PAT/field goal Defense forces third down Punt return Opponent backed up inside its 15 Punt block or safe return Final minutes of a half, our possession Field goal and hands team Sudden change, either direction Whichever unit could be next—counted and ready Special teams panic usually starts two plays before the unit runs on the field. FINAL THOUGHT Special teams win games before people notice them.

They win field position, steal momentum, protect possessions, create short fields and prevent disaster—but only if they are prepared. July is the time to build the system: personnel, backups, protection, coverage, return rules and sideline alerts. Do not wait until Week One to find out special teams are not ready. By then, the storm has already arrived. By Week One, every special teams problem already has a July date on it.