Squires Throwing a Beach Party to Unite Kingsmen

Any bullies looking to toss sand in the faces of Cal Lutheran football players had better watch out.

After next week, the Kingsmen will be immune to it.

First-year Coach Scott Squires is taking the team Tuesday to the Navy SEALS facility in Coronado, outside San Diego, for four days of training and bonding at the beach.

“I think it’ll be a real good way of bringing the team together,” Squires said. “We are calling it a time of inspiration and perspiration.”

Squires, 31, was hired at Cal Lutheran in March. He replaced Joe Harper, who was forced to resign in December. Squires coached wide receivers at Nevada Las Vegas last season and was a Kingsmen assistant before that.

He said the training-camp concept is similar to one used at Pacific Lutheran in Tacoma, Wash., where he played linebacker in the mid-1980s. When he got the Cal Lutheran job, Squires immediately thought about installing his own version. He has been working on the arrangements ever since.

Squires said he chose the SEALS’ base because of its location and because the commander approved of the idea.

The point, Squires said, is for the 100-man contingent to learn to work and relate to one another in a loose atmosphere accentuated by fun and games. Squires hopes the experience will help turn the Kingsmen into a cohesive unit that can improve on last year’s 4-4-1 record.

“I wanted to get this team together away from their comfort zone and build it up,” Squires said. “We are going to have a lot of fun.”

For the past few months, Squires and his staff have been drumming up games and activities for the team at the camp.

They include softball contests with outfielders positioned waist-deep in ocean water and football passing games with blindfolded quarterbacks who rely on verbal directions from teammates to locate receivers.

There is also a plan for a human-pyramid contest, in which the participants must maintain the pyramid for a certain amount of time.

“This is our way to kick off a new generation of Kingsmen football,” Squires said.