WACO, Texas (KXXV) — Midway football is making moves with its coaching staff, announcing Esrom Martinez and Josh Willis as Co-Defensive Coordinators.
Both coaches have worked together before on the JV staff and now will lead the defense together.
"Coach Martinez and I work, we work well together and it's just a way of bringing much of different ideals to the room," Willis said.
"We kind of know how each other work, you know, and I think Gillespie — he's a good man and he's trying to keep it in-house and trying to help us grow at the same time and you know Midway's always been a standard," Martinez said.
The Panthers had a successful season last year in head coach Joe Gillespie's first season — both coaches saw a lot of positives on the defensive side from the previous year and want to build on that for 2025.
"They were coachable — they played hard and we may not look the part, but we showed up in the last 4th quarter," Martinez said.
"Everybody knew that we were going to play hard — we're going to play physical, we're going to play tough and that's what Coach Creech preached. But at the same time, that's what Gillespie preaches every day. There's a standard here at Midway and there's always been a standard."
"Football is the ultimate team sport and we've got to do things to put our offense in a position to be successful get the ball back to the offense, make the opposing offense, snap it again make defense fun, fly around, and go hit somebody," Willis said.
Midway finished this past season 7-4 and made it to the first round of the playoffs.
