Photo courtesy of Kyle Southall.
The full team tasked with keeping Briarwood Christian School football players healthy and performing at their peak on Friday nights, led by Briarwood’s director of sports science and performance, Kyle Southall, fourth from left.
Briarwood Christian School’s football team plays for three hours on a Friday night, but for the school’s sports medicine staff, the work to get there starts nearly a week earlier.
Kyle Southall, Briarwood’s director of sports science and performance, said his preparation begins on Sundays, when he brings his four-year-old into the athletic training room for what he calls “drain the ice machine.” Early in the season, with the heat still heavy, that alone is no small task.
“This time of year, it’s just so hot. We go through about 200 pounds of ice a day,” Southall said.
From there, the week builds toward kickoff. Southall said practice intensity is structured like an inverted bell curve, heaviest on Monday, dropping to a medium Tuesday and a light Wednesday, then ticking back up to a medium Thursday before tapering off again ahead of game day. While the staff also handles nutrition planning and emergency action plans sent to visiting teams, Southall contacts EMS every Wednesday ahead of a home game to review protocols. The staff also touches base midweek with Birmingham meteorologist James Spann to get a read on Friday’s forecast, passing along anything the staff needs to prepare for.
By kickoff, the sideline crew numbers between 10 and 12 people. Assistant athletic trainer Aimee Dick, a Briarwood graduate returning to her alma mater, is part of that group. So is team physician Dr. Wayne McGough. Erin Gilbert, an Auburn senior and former Briarwood soccer player, serves as a sports medicine intern, alongside current Briarwood junior Lainey Knowlton, also interning with the program. Rounding out the group are head strength and conditioning coach Brandon Davis, Briarwood Athletic Performance Program Director Jacob Nilsson and strength coach Phoebe Greene, who monitors GPS data on the sideline throughout the game.
Those trackers, worn by 40 to 50 players at a time, flag when a player hits a workload threshold the staff calls a “yellow zone,” prompting adjustments to keep players fresh for the moments that matter most. The same staff also supports Briarwood’s volleyball and cross-country programs, among others, in the fall.
“We have 10 to 12 support staff that are rowing the boat to keep our best 11 on the field at any time,” Southall said.
As the season progresses, Southall said the emphasis shifts from building players up to keeping them there, through nutrition, sleep, hydration and recovery tools such as compression boots and massage guns. He likens it to a bank account.
“Every time you work out or every time you’re in a game, you’re pulling money out. Well, then you need to do something from a recovery standpoint, put money back in. Otherwise, you’re broke,” Southall said.
Fridays are the longest days of the week for Southall, who is up around 4:30 a.m. and doesn’t get home until well after midnight once postgame treatment wraps up. Still, he said the payoff makes it worth it.
Much of that work goes unnoticed by the public, from ordering game-day nutrition to the dozens of rehab sessions the staff runs each day. Only a few hours of that 60-hour work week are seen by the public.
On Friday nights, the athletic trainers are always within arm’s reach, ready to tend to any need an athlete has. But as Southall jokes, there is also some wisdom to be instilled when he is asked which players to serve with hydration-infused Powerade bottles.
“Go give it to a person who seems to be sweating a lot,” he said, with a laugh.
