NFHS Voice: Find Answers at Youth Level
November 13, 2019
By Karissa Niehoff
NFHS Executive Director
Are there long-term solutions to increasing the number of participants in high school sports and improving parental behavior at high school contests? The answer to both questions might start at the youth sports level.
The NFHS hosted a first-ever meeting of about 25 leaders of National Governing Bodies and the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee last week to discuss common concerns and opportunities to align and work together.
Within the youth areas of these organizations, the issues are familiar ones to high school leaders – decline in participation, parent behavior, coaches education and minimizing the injury risk. Clearly, however, reaching parents with appropriate educational messages on sportsmanship, injury risk and the values of participation is a top priority for leaders at all levels – youth, middle school and high school sports.
Recently, the NFHS formed a Middle School Committee in an effort to build interest in education-based sports at that level and to share the proper messages with parents before their kids reach high school. However, as we learned last week, middle school may even be too late!
Those educational messages will be enhanced if the process starts in out-of-school youth sports. If messages about the values of multi-sport participation, playing for the love of the game, and limiting contact in sports like football are consistently shared and demonstrated at the youth level, the education-based concept should be firmly in place by the time students reach high school.
Coaches education is another common concern. While the NFHS has created an outstanding online education program for interscholastic coaches through the NFHS Learning Center (www.NFHSLearn.com), there is no standard requirement to coach at the youth level. There should be some type of required certification for anyone to walk onto a field or court to coach. And while knowledge about teaching the proper tackling form in football or the proper defensive positioning in basketball is important, those are not the most important prerequisites for coaching.
Similar to the NFHS’ online Fundamentals of Coaching course, youth coaches should be required to take courses that help them learn how to coach the kids more so than the sport. And since many of the coaches at this level are parents of players on the team, these individuals – and all youth parents – should be presented materials similar to what is presented at preseason meetings at the high school level. This would include, among other things, the non-negotiable requirement to positively support their child while letting the coaches coach, and the officials officiate.
Lofty goals, for sure, without a collective governing organization over youth sports. However, these concepts can be endorsed and promoted within the youth areas of sport-specific NGBs. These fundamentals of education-based athletics are essential for the 2-3 percent who play sports beyond high school as well as the majority who apply the values learned in high school sports in their chosen careers.
The skills will eventually fade – even for those individuals who play sports beyond high school – but the values learned from playing sports, beginning at the youth sports level, will last a lifetime.
Dr. Karissa L. Niehoff is in her second year as executive director of the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) in Indianapolis, Indiana. She is the first female to head the national leadership organization for high school athletics and performing arts activities and the sixth full-time executive director of the NFHS, which celebrated its 100th year of service during the 2018-19 school year. She previously was executive director of the Connecticut Association of Schools-Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference for seven years.
Father & Son Set to Meet for 1st Time Coaching from Opposing Benches
By
Doug Donnelly
Special for MHSAA.com
December 10, 2025
The bantering back and forth is almost complete.
On Thursday, Mike and Zachary Zyla will finally coach against each other in a varsity girls basketball game.
It’s a game that both coaches circled months ago when Zachary, 26, got his first head coaching job at Britton Deerfield.
“It’s going to be intense,” Zachary said. “I’m sure he will want to win just as badly as I will. Me and our girls have been talking about the game a lot because it’s a game we think we can win. We want to beat Sand Creek.”
Mike Zyla coaches Sand Creek and is Zachary’s dad. He is a longtime coach in cross country and track and added varsity basketball to his resume three years ago. Zachary, who played at Sand Creek, was hired this past offseason to coach the Patriots.
Both schools are in the Tri-County Conference.
“It’s going to be fun,” Mike said. “We’ve been going back and forth about it for a couple of weeks. We’ll see how it goes.”
Basketball is special in the Zyla household.
Zachary’s other brother, Ryan, coaches at a junior college in Minnesota. His sister, Chelsi, played two years of college basketball after graduating from Sand Creek. Their mom, Kirsten, keeps the scorebook for Mike’s games. She is a special education teacher at Britton Deerfield.
“When basketball season rolls around, that’s all we talk about,” Zachary said.
“I guess it’s a little bit in the bloodlines,” Mike said.
After graduating from Sand Creek in 2018, Zachary served in the Navy. He returned home two years ago and served two seasons as his dad’s assistant.
“I just love the game of basketball,” he said. “I’ve been playing since I was probably 2 years old. It’s the thing I’m passionate about. I watch almost every night. If it’s not a live basketball game, I watch clips of old games. I’m just a junkie for basketball.”
Mike said he misses having his son on his bench.
“I miss having him on staff,” Mike said. “He’s really sharp, picking stuff up on the fly. It was nice having him on the sidelines with me. It’s a good opportunity for him, though.”
Please welcome BD’s new varsity girls basketball coach Zach Zyla! Zach comes to BD from Sand Creek where his father Mike is the head girls coach. Zach assisted on the Aggie varsity girls team in the 2024/25 season and is a track assistant coach for the Aggies. Go Patriots! pic.twitter.com/6cpwUw6OW4
— BD Athletics (@athletics_bd) May 2, 2025
Zachary accepted the job in time to have a summer program with BD.
“I’ve always been a big fan of basketball,” he said. “It’s in my blood. I started coaching the Sand Creek hoopsters when I was 16 years old. I knew that’s what I wanted to do. I would say coaching at the varsity level was a goal of mine. It’s always been a dream of mine. I didn’t expect to get a head coaching job so soon. I’d like to get to the next level someday.”
He said he has a few new things for his team to run against his dad.
“He taught me a lot, but our coaching strategies are different,” Zachary said. “I think I’m going to have some things he hasn’t seen yet.”
Sand Creek and BD both lost their season openers Tuesday. Since BD’s game started at 4:30 p.m., Zachary was able to get to Sand Creek to see his dad’s game against Pittsford.
“He was able to scout us,” Mike said.
It’s all in good fun.
“We have a great relationship,” Zachary said. “We bounce ideas off each other all of the time. Even for our first game of the season, we were talking about what we should do, the offenses and defenses. We talk pretty much every day.”
As rare as it is for a father and son to coach against each other, it’s the second time it’s happened in Lenawee County in recent years. Hudson varsity boys basketball coach Jeff Webster coached against his son, Jamison Webster, when Hudson played Tecumseh two seasons ago.
Jamison said it was a great experience, one the Zylas will never forget.
“Coaching and competing against my dad’s teams at Hudson over the last few years has been a great experience,” he said. “We both want to win, being the competitors we are. That being said, the lifelong memories we have made being able to share a sport we both love is what makes it special.”
Zachary said he knows it will be a little different than normal.
“The game’s intensity will be higher than most nights,” he said.
Mike agreed. He doesn’t relish the idea of beating his son, but doesn’t plan on backing down. Since they are both in the TCC, they’ll face off again later this winter.
“We’re both pretty competitive,” he said. “Competitive genes are in the family. I don’t think either one of us will be very happy if we are on the losing side Thursday night.”
Doug Donnelly has served as a news and sports reporter at the Adrian Daily Telegram and the Monroe News for 30 years, including 10 years as city editor in Monroe. He's written a book on high school basketball in Monroe County and compiles record books for various schools in southeast Michigan. He is now publisher and editor of The Blissfield Advance, a weekly newspaper. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Jackson, Washtenaw, Hillsdale, Lenawee and Monroe counties.
PHOTO Britton Deerfield varsity girls basketball coach Zachary Zyla poses for a photo with his father Mike Zyla, right, the varsity girls basketball coach at Sand Creek. (Photo provided by the Zyla family.)