Kerwin Bell: From Walk-On to SEC Player of the Year, Building Winners & Betting on Yourself

speaker-0: number one thing is is just to have always have a positive outlook on life. You're in a time of your life where you're going through a transition. And so for them just to stay positive, just believe in yourself and and just work always under under always believe. I learned this on a tobacco farm where I grew up with my dad. Man, hard work always takes care of everything. We lose a game or two here, there's no panicking. There's no talking about other people, blaming other guys. What we got to do is just work a little bit harder. Because hard work will always pay off. It will always help you overcome anything you need to overcome. And so keep that work ethic, stay positive, and just believe in yourself. And ⁓ if you do those things, ⁓ you'll be successful in life. Yeah. This college crowd setting James on the mic preaching gospel Stories that never get old Ain't no bench warm hearts on the show Stadium lies let a preferred walk on no scholarship still putting it on from the church until gate hands

speaker-1: Welcome to the Preferred Walk On Show, the People's College Football Show. I am your host, Seth Saunders, and in college football, we celebrate the finished product, the star quarterback, the championship coach, the program that suddenly becomes relevant again. But what we rarely see are the years of rejection, reinvention, and relentless belief required to get to the mountaintop. Today's guest began his co college career without a scholarship and without any guarantee that he would ever see the field. But he didn't need a guarantee. All he needed was an opportunity. He walked on at the University of Florida, fought his way onto the field, and became the SEC player of the year, eventually launching a professional career that would span more than a decade. But his greatest impact on the game came after he stopped playing. As a coach, he has built explosive offenses, developed quarterbacks, won conference championships, and also national championships. And now at Western Carolina, he is rebuilding belief in a program and proving that transformation doesn't begin with facilities, rankings, or outside expectations. It begins when a group of people decide that the past no longer gets to define what comes next. His journey is a lesson in betting on yourself, developing others, adapting without abandoning who you are, and understanding that sometimes The people who are overlooked become the ones most capable of seeing potential in everyone else. Today, an enormous preferred walk-on welcome for Western Carolina head football coach Kerwin Bell. Coach, welcome to the show. Yeah, well, you got a lot of good things to talk about, coach. Well, hey man, I want to start here. Look, it for someone who has never experienced Western Carolina football or spent time in Culloway, what makes the program, its fan base, and the surrounding community such a special place to be a part of?

speaker-0: Thanks, man. Appreciate the intro introduction. You know, I grew up in Florida, North Florida, and then had a chance to play at the University of Florida and then, you know, had a chance to coach at Valdassa State, which is South Georgia, which is really you're talking about football, man, they bleed and die, you know, they they die of football down there. So ⁓ the passion. And so I came up here thinking that there's no way that could be matched up here. And I seen so many ⁓ I seen such a passionate fan base here. You know, we had never won a Southern Conference Championship in the last sixty years. And ⁓ but these people show up relentless every Saturday. Our stadium probably is eighty, ninety percent field every Saturday sellouts on on big games. They're just very passionate about the the the Western Carolina catam outs and it's been a passion of theirs. They wanna win a championship and we wanna bring it bring ⁓ one here before ⁓ before I leave for sure. And hopefully this year is the year to get it done.

speaker-1: Well, coach, you have had an incredible career as a player and and now as a coach. But before the championships you've won a and the records and and your long and successful professional career, you started at an as an overlooked high school athlete in Florida. And I'm curious, what did being overlooked put inside you that's never left you? Well

speaker-0: You know, I think one thing is is that really helped me throughout my career was just I've always looked at looked at the positives in life, you know, and and ⁓ and tried to find those things that that could help me become successful. And so, you know, as a as a as a walk on ⁓ at the University of Florida, I remember I walked in there that first day, I was eight string and people said, That's been forty something years. How do you remember that? I said, Hey, it's very traumatic when you walk in the locker room, there's eight names and you're at the bottom. So I always remember that depth chart and And then to move up to fifth string, you know, six months later because three guys graduated, one of them being the starting quarterback Wayne Peace. Moving into fifths to the fifth string spot and then ⁓ you know, making a run there in one year going from eighth string to first string was was amazing. But ⁓ you know, it was ⁓ it it's been spectacular for me just to the I've been blessed the the life I've been able to live and been able to go through a lot of different tough moments in my life, but I also been able to make it because I I never always believed in myself. You know, and I I try to tell that to young people, don't listen to what anybody else around you t says. If you believe in it and you're a little lucky, then you got a chance to to be successful in life. And you know, people say luck, well that what is that word? To me, lucky, it what it means is an opportunity meets preparation. And when I was when I had that opportunity in the University of Florida, I remember in the fall of nineteen eighty four after being an eight string quarterback the year before. When I got that opportunity, they gave me opportunity to get into top top four and compete for a job those three weeks. I was prepared. And ⁓ if you're prepared to to to take advantage of those opportunities, that's when you'll do great things in in your life.

speaker-1: You've mentioned the journey at Florida and walking on there and having such a big ladder to climb. When you look back on that two year span from getting on campus in Gainesville to your starting games at the swamp, what was the moment or was there one where you went, Man, I belong here. Like I I can play here and I'm supposed to be here. Well

speaker-0: Luckily it was probably the first game, you know, play on ESPN out there. It was the first nationally televised college football game in nineteen eighty four. First game of the season we played in Tampa Stadium against the defending national champion, Miami Hurricanes. You know, so everything was there and and I probably as a walk on I probably had to do well or I I probably would never play another down at the University of Florida. But, you know, sorta went through the game, was was we were in it. But With about five minutes to go, something like that, we went on a s like a seventy yard drive and ⁓ I converted a couple of fourth downs. I threw a touchdown pass. And I think that sort of set me to the point where I could s you know, I knew that I could do the job against a a great football team. They came back and beat us in the last forty five seconds with Bernie Kozar. But to know that that you were able to do that on a big stage on national T V, I think not only did I know that I could play at that level, but my coaches also believed in me from that point on. Do you

speaker-1: think because you walked that path and and understood what it was like to be a walk on and come in and have to build something. Do you think when you got into coaching and as a coach, it has changed how you evaluate kids? And do you think you probably have a better eye for the global view of a kid who's maybe under recruited or maybe somebody else isn't looking at over maybe coaches that haven't experienced that journey themselves? Well

speaker-0: the last five years here we've we've probably given out fourteen, fifteen scholarships to walk on's to ⁓ to guys who've come in here and ⁓ and show us that they can play at this level, help us win a championship. And so I it's just what it's done to me is open my eyes to, you know, don't don't never turn anybody away or don't ever not give up on or don't give up on it, you know, a person quickly. I believe there's always an opportunity for a guy to grow. There's late bloomers. There's always those guys who who get left behind. And ⁓ we've been that kind of program wherever I've been is that we develop players and we do it by bringing guys in who maybe not everybody don't want. But ⁓ we know the kind of players that we want to win with, especially on offense, you know, the kind of quarterback we want, the kind of receivers that we we desire. They don't have to be the biggest guys. They just have to be ⁓ very athletic and be able to drop their hips and play extremely athletic. And so Because of that, we just pick the guys we think's gonna help us be successful. And we find a lot of misfit toys, sorta, you know, misfit players because maybe they're not the s the exact height they need to be or whatever or or weigh what they should weigh. But they ⁓ they have division one athletic ability. That's what I always tell our coaches. I want a guy who has division one athletic ability. Don't bring me a six two, two hundred and ten pound receiver who Looks good getting off the bus, but can't get in and out of his routes, can't be explosive. We're not gonna be that kind of football team. We're gonna be very athletic and very sorta the same way in in our approach is the way we commit ourselves to to the kind of players that we want.

speaker-1: When your playing career was ending, you later returned to Gainesville and you had the opportunity to work under Coach Spurrier, what did he understand about offense that was different from the conventional thinking of that era? And how did that example influence you as a young coach?

speaker-0: Well, you know, I went through high college my second year, people said, you know, the the academic people saying, What do you want to do to major in? I I th I don't know. I don't know what I want to do other than play football. But I got my degree in psychology, which wound up being great for for coaching. But it was two years after college, never thought about coaching at all. But when I went to Coach Sprayer, ⁓ tore my knee up, had I had to have ACL reconstruction. And that was 1990, my second year in the league. ⁓ the Buccaneers released me. It happened during the offseason playing pickup basketball. So they released me and when they did Steve Spurrier just got to Florida, I called him. He gave me an opportunity to become a graduate assistant for him. That's when I decided in my life, this is what I want to do. I want to coach college football. I want to have an impact on young people the way Coach Spurrier had. But also what really got me was just the perfection that he almost gained on the field. The way the precision of the routes, the the timing with the quarterback, all those things, the spacing, those things really intrigued me. And it got me to the point where this is, you know, this is what I want to do, man. I that really you know, back when I played, man, you just found a guy that was open and threw it to him. But his his just the way he approached the game, how precise things were really caught my attention. And and after that, you know, f few months that I was with him, I said, Hey, when I get through playing, I that's what I want to do is coach college football.

speaker-1: Coach, over over your career, you've built winners at all levels high school, non-scholarship football, division two, ⁓ and now at the FCS level. And and despite the differences between those levels, the one constant has been your ability to build teams that win. What truths about building a program have remained constant with you at each?

speaker-0: Well, I think the first thing is players, right? People always say, How do you win? How have you been able to win everywhere you've been? And I said, Because I picked the right players. You know, I think too too many times coaches get all this, you know, they make these millions of dollars and they because they can build these great cultures and they can win games, which is true. You you have a big part in that. But one of the biggest reasons that you're able to do that, I believe, is that you know how to pick the right players. And what we look for is guys who have that athletic ability to help us win a division, you know, help us win a championship, national championship. But we also then that's just the start of our recruitment. You know, we then go into a guy, is he a self starter? That's my number one characteristic. Does he have great character? Is he a self starter? Talking to their academic counselors, to their to their ⁓ strength conditioning coaches. Is he the first one in, last one out? So we want to be that guy. We want to have that football team. I tell ⁓ you know, our locker is right below me right here. I want a hundred and twenty guys of self starters, guys who believe in in that wanna be great, that wanna work to be great. And what we have, we have that. And I've been able to do that everywhere because we pick those kind of players. And so on the weekends you'll see our receivers or our D Bs or our D linemen will be down in the pit on their own after a whole week of work. You know, they'll be down there working on their own. And when you have that kind of group, you're gonna win games. You're gonna win championships. And so ⁓ that's what we've been able to do and I think that's what's helped us make s you know become successful. I think offensively we have one of the best offenses in the country since I, you know, since we've been coaching football on the college level. If you think about it, we've had, we've led the nation. Now we've led the nation at three different locations, three different divisions. I don't know if anybody's ever been able to do that before. At three different locations, three different divisions, we'd have been able to l to win, you know, the national championship. And so we've been able to do a lot of great things and it it goes back to the kind of players that we we bring on campus.

speaker-1: Coach, for somebody listening to to our show and and being exposed to you for the first time and being exposed to the Western Carolina football program for the first time, if they were to hear the word loat, what would that mean and how would you explain that to ⁓ LOT? LOT

speaker-0: If that he hear the word what? Okay, loat. Live on the edge?

speaker-1: Yes, sir.

speaker-0: Well, that's one of our our marks that we've had here at at ⁓ Western and our other places. And what we mean is that we wanna we wanna be aggressive. We wanna have our toes in the ground. I want you when you come and watch us play, I want you to see that we're a football team that plays extremely aggressive. Our coaches call the game extremely aggressive. And we want our players to never feel like they're on their heels because of the plays that we've called. I I want them to always feel like they're the in attack mode and We've given them a chance to go make plays. I said, you know, I said, Hey, I may get fired because I I ⁓ I'm very aggressive, but that's just who we're gonna be. That's what I want our team to be about. And if it's the backup or the third string, they all play the same way and they play very aggressive and get after it and and you know, play very physical football.

speaker-1: You talked earlier about the amount of players over the last few years who have earned and been awarded scholarships. What in your eyes separates a walk-on who merely has a roster spot versus one who's able to progress and become so indispensable to the program that they garner a scholarship?

speaker-0: Well, it starts with a guy, you know, that has a desire to to be great, right? And ⁓ you know, you have some walk calls, they're just proud to be on the team, right? You you have that. ⁓ you have scholarship players. Sometimes it's like that. But you have those special players, you know, Colombo, our receiver here, who tore his ACL, missed all last year, but a year before he was all conference. He came here and start and started as our punt returner as day one as a true freshman walk on, earned a scholarship after his second season and has led our team and receiving yards the last couple of years, other than when he had the the injury. So but he's just a a kid who works extremely hard. He makes the most of his talents. He gets the most out of it. And when you see a kid that's that every day gets something goes to work and you trust him, then you're ⁓ you're willing to, you know, go to go to battle with him. And ⁓ I tell our players all the time the only way we'll win a championship is if I trust you and you trust me to the point where we can go out and play the game the way it's supposed to be played. And And and I don't care if it's a walk on or or a scholarship guy, we're gonna play the very best guys who give us that chance to go win a championship.

speaker-1: Coach, if y'all have prepared for the twenty twenty six season and and are about to start practicing for the twenty twenty-six season, what excites you about this group and what do you think the ceiling is?

speaker-0: Yeah, we had OTAs this morning about six A.M. So we're just getting getting off the field up from some OTAs. We're having a great we had a great all season, great summer here. And yeah, in a couple of weeks, man, we'll get to camp. And what I really like about this football team is that, you know, we've had those dynamic offenses here in the past and been able to put up a lot of points. But I think as an overall football team, depth Big guys, small guys, you know. We're always gonna we always had the small guys, the athletic guys, the receivers, the D B's. ⁓ we've always had the skill players. But I think our big body guys are gonna be the O linemen, those D linemen are gonna be as good as we've ever had. And that's what you gotta have to go win a championship and especially in the Southern Conference, which is a very physical conference. So I feel very good about the the offseason we've had. I feel very good about the kind of football team we have as far as the experience and and the ability to go play and and play at a high level and do it as a team, you know, a with with everybody sorta taking the turn to help us win and and that's special teams, defense, offense. I think we don't have a real well rounded football team that could go win a lot of different ways. Coach

speaker-1: We go down the road ten, twenty, thirty years and and your former players are are sitting around the table sharing a cold beverage or two, what do you hope they remember about Coach Bell that has nothing to do with things on the field but how how you impacted their life and helped them become successful men? Well

speaker-0: I hope they they ⁓ and I do I you know, you hear this from a lot of the players that come back just talks about how we made it fun, but we also held ⁓ very accountable. You know, I think players sometimes some you hear some people say, Well, this players have changed. Well, I don't think so. I think they still wanna be coached hard. They still wanna have a disciplined environment that they can that they can come and and and ⁓ and do well in. ⁓ but they just want a guy so that they can trust that knows gonna hold ⁓ accountable and gonna give them the best opportunity to go be the best player and best person they can be. And I tell my wife all the time the the beautiful thing about my life, man, I've had opportunity to be a head coach everywhere I've been. Only one year was I not a head coach and that was in two ⁓ two thousand nineteen with Coach Strong at South Florida after we won the national championship in eighteen at Valdasta. ⁓ I I took the job as O. C. There at South Florida with Coach Strong. We got fired after a year. So but other than that I've been a head coach and and the reason I I love being a head coach because I think all I I'm doing really is being a servant to young men. That's I feel like that's what this job's about. You know, we get paid a lot of, you know, especially these FBS guys get paid. But what their job should be and what I really truly believe it is, and that's what I care about it so much and being a head coach is that we are a servant to young men. If they need a tutor, they need a s a something to help them academically, by God, it's my job to get that done for them, to make sure they can give them the best chance to be successful and they get their degree. If it's something in the, you know, they come in, my door is always open. If they want to come in and talk about things that are going on in their life, I want to help them reach that level to the point where they can become a great young man, a great father, a great husband. That's my job is sort of to help in that area. And then the last thing is put them on the field, give them coaching that can give them the bet chance to be the best player they can possibly be. And so that's my job is to be a servant to young men and make sure that we're doing the best things we can to help them be successful, not only as players, but as people. And to a man, I think everybody believes that I I truly believe that. And I want that to happen for everybody that comes through our program. And because of that, we have a a lot of great men that go on and become, you know, great people in our society, man. I want guys to leave here and be positive influences on our society and and I think they they are are doing that.

speaker-1: All right, coach, we close all our interviews the same way. I'm gonna ask you to hop in Doc Brown's DeLorean with me and we're gonna go back to your final game as a player for the Gators. You get ⁓ you get to go walk off the field with number twelve, throw your arm around his shoulder pads, and you get to give him one piece of advice before he embarks on the journey that's ahead of him. What's the one piece of advice you give to him?

speaker-0: That's good question. You know, I think the big thing, the number one thing is is just to have always have a positive outlook on life. And like I said, I think that's helped me tremendously throughout my career. But as you man, especially when you graduate from from college, these guys have such a huge there's such a big jump they gotta have in their life. ⁓ a lot of things you don't know what's gonna happen. You know, it's y you're in a time of your life where you're going through a transition. And so for them just to stay positive. Just believe in yourself and just work always underst always believe this. And my I learned this on a tobacco farm where I grew up with my dad. Man, hard work always takes care of everything. You know, we lose a game or two here or wherever I've been. There's no panicking. There's no talking about other people, blaming other guys. What we gotta do is just work a little bit harder because hard work will always pay off. It will always help you overcome anything you need to overcome. And so keep that work ethic. Stay positive and just believe in yourself. And ⁓ if you do those things, you'll be successful in life.

speaker-1: Well, coach, I certainly appreciate the time today. It was awesome to talk with you. ⁓ the Catamounts were one of my favorite teams to watch last year. Y'all were absolutely electric. So I am ⁓ fired up to watch y'all play this fall. Before you go, please tell our listeners any way they can support Western Carolina and Catamouts this year. Well.

speaker-0: ⁓ we w you know, we are we are a team that that's up here in the mountains, sorta to ourselves. You know, the the d the way things happen, you know, in college football with the portal and now NIL, ⁓ we're behind a little bit, but man, we've got some great supporters here. We just we just raised over a hundred million dollars. We have gone from the last game last season to the first game of this year. We'll have over thirty, I'm sorry, over forty million dollars of improvements to our stadium and our facilities. Here in football. So we are making some great investments here. We are making commitments here to to be a great program. And ⁓ I think the success over the last three or four years have have opened up the eyes of a lot of people. Like I said, there's been a lot of passionate fans here. And all the fans out there, man, just just understand it takes it takes money, it takes support to ⁓ continue to stay up with everybody else, man. People these NILs are going getting out of control, you know. Even at our level, we've got people spending million, million and a half dollars on NIL. And we're nowhere near that. So we've got to again recruit, recruit high school kids, develop those guys. But we also just need our guy our people, you know, the Catamout Nation to to support us and give us a chance to go go you know go win a championship. I wanna, I wanna, you know, I tell our team all the time, I know I'm taking up a little time, but I tell my team all the time when we're at meetings, I said, Do you realize that you've been placed here? Maybe your mom and dad had you, you know, 18 to 22 years ago. They were able to have you as a as a child. And because of that, You're sitting in these seats tonight to go win a Southern Conference Championship. And and listen, there's no other greater feeling than to do something that's never been done in the history of of Western Carolina. I did the same thing in the University of Florida. We in 1984, we won the SEC Championship. Florida had never won an SEC championship in 60 years. And when we came back from from Kentucky playing that game, the last game of the season to win the championship. I remember riding on buses through Gainesville to get back to the stadium where there was already forty thousand people in the stadium and I seen grown men crying in the streets, walking around sort of in a daze, crying because they'd never experienced winning a championship. I think the same thing will happen here. We've got great fans, they are passionate, like I said earlier, and ⁓ we're gonna bring a championship to them and I think this might be the year to to go get it done. Well I

speaker-1: I can tell you this. I've spent twenty-five minutes with you. And if I was a Western Carolina supporter, I would feel very, very good about the hands that the program are in and the possibilities that are in front of us, Coach. I'd play for you in a heartbeat, brother. Hey man, we appreciate you and wishing y'all nothing but ⁓ health and success this season. All right.

speaker-0: Thanks a lot. Appreciate it.