If you're interested in it, Brian's talking about it. You're with Brian Kilmeade. We got to stay physical. I want you to beat each other up in practice.
I'm telling you, it's a good thing. Here's a common denominator about a state championship team. It's never the coach's team. It's always the leader's team or the seniors in this case. It's always your leader who's going to take over and be accountable for everything that happened. And once these boys get that, I think we're well on our way. We got a running team, guys are running the ball, and they're not going to step-brother you. They don't feel sorry for you.
They don't care about you. You got to work outside. I may not beat every block, but God dog it, I'm going to set the edge. Mansfield, that's sweet, man. It's our first home game. Here's the thing, we ain't taking nobody for granted. The goal is right now, if anybody is in our way, we want to whip the piss out of them. That's what we want to do.
I don't want to catch your grandma running through there in a shoulder pad. She's going to get knocked out too. Well, that is Coach Carter, one of the coaches is coaching with Danny Duran, head football coach and chancellor of the Evangelical Christian Academy in Shreveport, Louisiana. This is going to be a series on Fox Nation. It is a must-see series. You'll love it.
Sports fan or not, God Family Football. It's right now on foxnation.com. If you don't order it, get the app.
You'll have all the stuff on the app. Plus, catch new episodes every Friday. And today is Friday, of course. Joining us now to talk more about the series, which is very focused on him, and he puts the focus on kids and God, is coach and pastor Danny Duran. Danny, welcome. Thank you for having me, Brian.
All right, Danny, so give some backstory. What had you, a pastor, rejoin the Christian Academy? Well, you know, I've actually been in ministry, that is preaching the gospel, since I was 17 years old. So during my time as a college player, as a pro player, and then as a coach all these years, I've always done both. And I've always felt like football was a great gathering place for young men to be able to give them the message of Christ.
So we have used that in a powerful way through the years. So, I mean, you're an inventor, you're an educator, an entrepreneur, a coach, and a pastor, obviously a great communicator. But what is it about this school that first attracted you, where you thought you could really help?
Describe this community. Well, my mom started this school in 1980, and I'd been a college football coach, and I came home, I thought I was done coaching. Where were you coaching prior? I was at Evangel University in Springfield, Missouri, and so I came home. Mom had started this whole school, and she said, I want you to give these boys a football experience.
So I thought, how hard can it be? Well, that first year I played, I prayed more for protection of their lives than I did for victories, I can tell you. But we started the program in 1989, and then it became very successful. We won 14 state championships under six different head coaches that I appointed. And I stayed involved in the program, but never went back as a head coach until five years ago, when we hadn't won a game halfway through the season, and I realized it was a startup.
We had 28 players, 68 upperclassmen had graduated, and so it was time for the old man to come back and start it again. So that's what I did. First off, how do you explain your initial success? You're not allowed to recruit, right? Right.
So how did you do it? Well, success absolutely draws people, and people ask us, what about all those great quarterbacks you had? Here's the interesting thing, seven of those quarterbacks were preacher's kids. That is, they were my sons and the sons of pastors on my staff. Now, what's amazing is two of those guys were the USA player of the year, and then another one of them, which was one of my sons, was the Gatorade player of the year in Louisiana. So we got them several places. One of the places is we gave birth to them. And so that's kind of a thumbnail of the years of success that we had. So the pandemic really hurt your program. When they came back, you guys weren't the same team, so you come back, and that's where this picks up, correct?
This story? Yes, absolutely, yes. And what type of team are we going to see? I'm 72 years old. What kind of theme are we going to see here? Well, you're going to see some football, but it's not all about football. And I would say to the ladies in the audience, you're going to love this show. I would say to the children in the audience, you're going to love this show.
My six-year-old grandson binged on this show two or three times in the first month. It's something that the whole family will enjoy. And it's all about their lives, and you get involved in their lives. We are an anomaly because we are on the other side of the track, private school. We make it happen for kids, not just football players, but for students from K-5 all the way up to have an opportunity to go to this wonderful school where we can share the love of Christ with them. So you always talk, you talk a lot about religion, right?
Well, about Jesus. When we talk about religion, I think we tend to talk about whether you're a Baptist or a Catholic. But the fact is here, we have kids from everywhere, every kind of denominational background, and many, many of our kids are unchurched. They don't have to be Christians to come to our school.
We just want kids that are willing to come and obey the rules and allow us to have their ear and their hearts to be able to share the message of Christ with them. Understood. So that plays a role in all this. When you say other side of the tracks, is there tuition? Yes, there is.
Yes, there is. But our tuition is lower than anyone in private schools in this area and in most areas of the country. And we work very, very hard with the state to take advantage of their scholarship programs so that children can have a private education that could never have one before. A lot of times your guys go on to play college football.
What percentage? Well, you know, I don't know, but we've had over 125 kids play at D1 schools. And we actually, Brian, and this blows my mind, we have seven active players in the NFL right now. Who are they? Well, we've got Jerry Tillery, Trent Taylor, Arderius Washington.
We've got Elijah Chapman, who is a rookie with the New York Giants, Miles Cole, who's with the Jacksonville team. Oh, you did it. But I'm just saying that it's so impressive. So here's an example, but you're not telling them, you listen to me, I'll get you to the NFL. You're just saying, I'll be able to maximize your talent, but you have to have a balanced life.
Especially in a game like yours, the best players, a lot of times get these devastating injuries. If you don't have values and ethics, you're lost and you wasted your time. So well said. So well said.
Yes. And these kids buy in, they love what we do here. We have a seven o'clock every morning doctrinal Bible study. That's just basic study of the Bible that would relate to anyone who wanted to know what the Bible has to say about life. And they are there five days a week. We have a worship time. And then I pray over them every morning.
I pray a father's blessing. Some of these kids don't have dads. Some of them have absentee dads or they don't have a good experience with their fathers.
And so it's the only time in their life they've ever heard a dad pray over their lives. So the other thing, Denny, is you are tough with them. Judging by some of the clips I've seen, it doesn't mean you're easy, correct?
No, no. Love is discipline and correction. So we do correct them. And also we allow them to understand that all of our correction is not so that they can win football games for the coach, but all of our correction is so that they can get to the next level of their performance and their success. Here you are doing what you do best, coaching.
Here's a clip from the series, God Family Football. For me, honestly, I'm a winner. You know, I don't ever want to lose. I don't want to be a player who only can play good in the first half.
So don't take a lot. Go work out, run the hill. You've got to earn it here. Whenever I'm running the hill and I'm getting tired, think about all of the struggling my mother goes through. Working overnight, two jobs, and I push through and get the job done. This is the secret to Friday night.
You get tired Friday night, we get beat. That's tough. But the family story is key, right? Football is football. But when you get the backstory and the people, that's kind of like, Danny, the reason why I loved Hard Knocks.
I like to get to know the people and the decision makers behind, and there's so much more than just the people on the field and the coaches. You're not doing this for money, correct? You're not doing this to get rich. And you're the coaches aren't doing it to get rich. Right.
No, not at all. In fact, they don't make as much here and will never make as much here as they could make across town or down the street at another high school. So how do we get to the point where you don't have to keep coming back with this program can live and survive without you? Well, you know, they can survive without me, but I don't want them to. You like coaching again. I want them to survive and I want them to be successful.
And they would be successful without me. But this is my calling, Brian. God has called me to this. And I know it with all of my heart. I'm seventy two years old.
I wake up every morning with my hair on fire. I can't wait to get here. It's my happy place at my stage of life. I can live anywhere in the world I want.
But this is my happy corner of the world. And it's because of the mission of being able to reach one child at a time and hopefully to change their destiny through the wonderful message that Christ loves them. So the Evangel Christian Academy in Shreveport, Louisiana, is the place. Head coach Denny Doran is the center of it. And we talk about God Family Football, a series only seen on Fox Nation.
A new episode drops every Friday. Coach, I can't wait to see it. Hey, thanks. Did you ever play football, Brian? I played soccer. I had to make a decision. You kind of have you kind of have an eye of a tiger. You look like you look like a competitor, you know. Well, I do have eligibility left. Maybe I should come back. Coach, you know, if I had a football guy in my life, it's just my whole town played soccer.
So I can't explain it. That's the real football, right? The real football. Oh, the first the first football. Thanks, coach. Thank you.
