Good football coaches plan. Everything.

From the minutiae of hourly and daily details to season goals and long-term program stability, design takes all into account, surprises unwelcome — mostly.

Josh Niblett planned the 2022 season, his first, with Georgia’s Gainesville football program. The former Hoover coach expected to win even though the Red Elephants hadn’t captured a region title since 2013 and played for a state championship since winning it in 2012.

Gainesville stunned experts with 14 straight wins in its run to the Class 6A state title game before falling to heavily-favored Langston Hughes 35-28.

Surprise?

“Yeah, probably a little bit,” Niblett said during Gainesville’s Hustle Up 7on7 competition at the Hoover Met Complex. “Just because you’re going into the unknown and it’s trying to learn everybody and still evaluate everybody and you don’t have much time to evaluate. It’s pretty much say, ‘hey, here’s the way we’re going to do it. Here’s our standard.’

“I think it was off the field stuff like the culture, which we had to make sure we had set like we wanted, and that was what was going to be on the field. That’s all we concentrated on, January, February, March. We didn’t talk about football. We talked about the work ethic, being in the classroom, doing the things that are right, things to do in the community, in our families.”

Niblett is no stranger to championships. He guided Oneonta to the 2004 Class 3A title then took Hoover to six championships in 14 seasons. The Bucs were 171-26 overall under Niblett, 92-8 in region play and 49-8 in state playoffs.

Gainesville is the third-winningest football program in Georgia history, but the Red Elephants had produced losing seasons in five of the previous six years before Niblett took over. They were 18-25 the past four seasons and hadn’t won a playoff game since 2015.

“Once we got in the football part, it was kind of learning what we’re doing, learn how to be students of the game, learn the game more, learn situations, be situational masters,” Niblett said. “Whereas before, being (at Hoover) for 14 years, that stuff kind of evolved every year and there it was like you’re speaking a different language to start off with.

“I think once we all got aligned and we all got on the same page as far as the language goes, terminology goes, our staff did a heck of a job of coaching our kids and our kids did a heck of a job learning.”

Under Niblett, the Red Elephants averaged 39 points a game and allowed 16.7. Gainesville trailed top-ranked Langston Hughes 23-6 at the half, but cut the margin to 35-28 with 3:59 left.

The Red Elephants played the best Class 6A team in the state to a single possession when Langston Hughes outscored its previous 14 opponents 757-149, a 54.1-10.6 margin of victory.

“You know me and nobody puts any more expectations than I put on myself and our players and our staff,” Niblett said. “I think it was just one of those where we had tough kids, had kids that wanted to win. We had people in the community that want to win and the support was unbelievable.

“Every day we came to work. Man, our kids worked to get better every day and they had an edge about them and they played with an edge about them. I think as we continued to understand what were doing on offense and defense, playing hard, playing with an edge, playing tough early on allowed us to be where we wanted to be at the end.

“And then once we started clicking on all cylinders, once you get in the playoffs, you know how that works.”

Niblett doesn’t fear expectations.

“I feel good about our staff and our kids,” Niblett said. “Our kids are just tough kids. They’re always going to give you an opportunity to win, I don’t care who you’re playing, and they’re talented kids, too.”

The plan for the upcoming season started soon after the championship loss. Competitions, camps and more provide the basis for 2023 football.

“It’s 7-on-7, it is what it is, but we come out here to compete, play with an edge, continue to create some shared experience,” Niblett said. “That’s what I’m about, just connection. We got to connect, we got to grow, we got to choose tough and then we got to have an investment. If we got those four things then we’ll be where we want to be at the end of the year.”