First Posted: 1/23/2014

FAIRMONT — Alignment and positioning is crucial pre-snap against run-heavy offenses intent on misdirection.

Fairmont found that out the hard way last fall when it had the county’s worst rush defense despite an 8-4 finish and dynamic playmakers on both sides of the football in Randy Ragland’s first season.

It was one of the many elements new defensive coordinator Ron Cook noticed as he watched film this week and something he says he’ll try and correct this summer when the Golden Tornadoes prepare for the 2014 campaign.

“I’m excited to get back in the Three Rivers Conference and see what I can do against a lot of those Wing-T teams,” said Cook who worked as Red Springs’ defensive coordinator before leaving for Lumberton prior to last season. “From what I’ve watched on tape during the East Bladen game, Fairmont got out-leveraged at the line of scrimmage because players were sometimes in the wrong alignment. I think we can get better and fix that. We’re going to be young, but from what I’ve heard there’s some junior varsity guys that will make an impact.”

Cook lasted less than a week as a free agent after Lumberton announced Mike Setzer as their new head coach. Cook was promoted to interim status when the Pirates parted ways with Joe Salas in October but was not chosen to lead the program into the fall at season’s end.

Lumberton’s administration welcomed Cook to stay on staff as an assistant, but he found opportunity elsewhere. He says he’s not interested in the current head coaching vacancy at South Robeson and made that known to Fairmont principal Kent Prater at his arrival.

With the Golden Tornadoes, his only worry will be on the defensive side of the ball.

“I have no animosity toward Lumberton and those guys understood it was time for me to move on and wished me luck,” Cook said. “It was important for me to stay in the area so I wouldn’t have to move my family. I wanted to help another program win. I’ve got a baby on the way and it seems like Fairmont was the right fit for me and my family.”

Ragland says the addition of an assistant coach with a defensive pedigree in the 3-4 should pay dividends for a roster that suffered heavy graduation losses, especially during game prep each week.

“He brings knowledge to that side of the ball and we struggled over there a bit,” Ragland said. “It wasn’t a coaching problem, but instead it was my philosophy that hurt us. We should’ve run a 3-4 look more than we did. The couple times we used that defense our kids were excited and we shut out Red Springs. We played our best defense in the 3-4.”

If history repeats itself, the offseason coaching caravan’s latest stop in Robeson County will benefit Fairmont sooner rather than later. Cook led the conference’s top defense at league champion Red Springs in 2012 and at Lumberton, despite a 1-10 record, spearheaded a unit that forced an area-high 25 takeaways.

Cook will teach special education at Fairmont and work as the Golden Tornadoes’ defensive coordinator, hoping to strengthen a unit that gave up 28.2 points per game last season.

“I’ve been given the freedom to implement my plan on defense and to try and get Randy’s offense a couple more stops next season,” Cook said.

Reach Brad Crawford at 910-272-6111 or on Twitter @MrPalmettoSDS.