Brandywine gearing up for year two under Justin Kinzie

NILES, Mich. – The Brandywine Bobcats are gearing up for year two under head coach Justin Kinzie.

Twin brothers Brock Dye and Conner Dye look to lead the Cats after a disappointing 4-6 campaign last season.

“He (Justin Kinzie) brings energy, he brings younger energy that we can relate to; we are just high school kids, so we relate to that on the field and off the field as well.” said senior Conner Dye.

“Expectations are always that we want to win football games, but I am a big believer that you don’t win football games by walking in and saying hey, we are going to win football games. There are 600 teams in Michigan saying we are going to win football games and a whole bunch of them aren't,” said head coach Kinzie.

Before coming to Brandywine last year, Kinzie had coaching stops at South Bend Washington, South Bend Adams, Mishawaka Marian and South Bend Riley.

“I try my best to be a leader and be more initiative, especially with the lower classmen who don’t really know as much and how it works on varsity,” said senior Kaiden Reith.

“We have been through a lot since Kinzie came through this past year. This year, summer workouts and all that, and our expectations are to get better every day, that’s the only thing we can do. The only thing we can do is control what we can control,” said senior leader Brock Dye.

The Bobcats are looking to finish over .500 for the first time since 2019-2020 where they finished the regular season undefeated but lost to Constantine in the postseason, 58-8.

Kinzie continued, “They are worked, they are hard workers, and they have great work ethic. I always joke around and say that with this community, if I told them we are having workouts at 2 a.m., they would show up. They would drop their kids off and we would be in the weightroom at two in the morning.”

Hard work and doing things the right way is what Kinzie and the Bobcats program is all about. The Cats will open the season on the road at Watervliet on August 24.