Chris Huston (00:02.414)
All right, our D2 extravaganza gets underway with coach Tony Anise, who has led Ferris State since 2012. And he has turned it into a division two powerhouse national titles in 2021, 22 and 24. That's last year. That's three of the last four national titles at the division two level folks. Before Ferris, he won two NGCAA championships at Grand Rapids Community College and three Michigan state titles at the high school level.

His reputation is for player development, continuity, and relentless standards. And once again, his Bulldogs are atop the division two rankings with a five and O record, and they are dominating the competition in the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference as usual. Coach, thanks for coming on the show.

Tony Annese (00:46.517)
Thanks Chris, appreciate you having me.

Chris Huston (00:49.122)
You're in Big Rapids, Michigan. Everyone's heard of, a lot of people have heard of Grand Rapids. I haven't heard of Big Rapids. Is it a rivalry thing there as far as one rapids being bigger than the other?

Tony Annese (01:02.465)
Yeah, Grand Rapids is a lot bigger than Big Rapids. Grand Rapids is 45 miles south of here. It's the second biggest city in the state of Michigan. And Big Rapids is a tiny little place, kind of off the beaten path a little bit. But Ferris State's had an unbelievable tradition academically and athletically. And so we've been around a long time and like in the late 1800s.

it was originated. And so it's been around a long time, but, yeah, Grand Rapids is a much bigger city.

Chris Huston (01:39.918)
You know, your coaching record is so impressive. What got you into coaching football and who were some of your main influences as a coach?

Tony Annese (01:48.043)
So what got me in was my father who was a high school teacher, administrator, and head football coach for 26 years. And so, and he was the main influence for me as well. Although, you know, I have three brothers, all of which chose not to be in education. They wanted to make a little bit more money than I made in my life. And so they went.

a different area because my dad's like, don't get into education. But I didn't listen to him much. And so I was a high school teacher for 25 years before I became a college coach. but but, you know, I just saw what kind of impact he had in the community I grew up in. And I remember going to to Kmart or McDonald's and and running into former players of my dad's. And as we were, you know, as we were out and about, they would

all say, hey, what an impact you had on my life. And so I'm like, man, that's the greatest thing on earth, you know, to have that kind of a positive, you know, impression on young people. And so people say that, you know, a coach has does more influencing and impacting young people in one year, what most people have in a lifetime. So.

Chris Huston (03:11.736)
Very true, very true. You know, I'm going to talk about your coaching philosophy a bit. If I were trying to reverse engineer what you've done at Ferris State, what core philosophy would I need to guide me? What are the principles that your program is built on?

Tony Annese (03:25.333)
Well, our four core values are faith, order, love and discipline. And that, you know, is an acronym for fold. So our motto is to be in the fold, which means to be intertwined together and, know, profound brotherhood. And then faith, order and love and discipline are the, you know, obviously the benchmarks to our program. When I took the job, just an example of faith, when I took the job, you know, there was nothing

that indicated that we would be anything. So the only thing I really could sell was myself and my staff and that our guys had to have faith that something significant was gonna happen. And so that's what we sold and it's worked.

Chris Huston (04:12.033)
You know, in a coaching profession that is filled with people who are constantly climbing, it seemed that you were very patient at the high school level. seemed very content there. And then you went to the junior college level before going to Ferris state. It doesn't seem like you're one of those who is angling, for new positions, all the time. Is this, are you just happy where you are? Or is it just a matter of you maybe not getting the attention that, that we would typically get,

for your success.

Tony Annese (04:42.805)
Well, yeah, it's a little late to the college game, right? So, you know, like Kurt Signecki was a D2 coach in 2016, you know, when we were actually in the semifinals, that's first time we made the semifinals. So, but he was a college coach who had been at Alabama and he had, you know, obviously came back to IUP, which is division two school and, and then moved up from there where I was, you know, I was new to the college game. You know, I

Chris Huston (05:11.906)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (05:12.639)
Started division two football here in 2012 and so being a 25 year high school teacher and a 22 year high school head coach they gave me great connections in the state of Michigan and and you know, I was I was already in the Michigan High School football coaches Hall of Fame You know prior to even being a college coach so but I didn't

You know, when I was a high school coach, I never really thought about being a college coach. Truthfully, it didn't, it didn't, you know, wasn't a force in my mindset. You know, I have four kids and so I'm like, you know, I never really want to give my life away to being a college football coach. I love my opportunity to, to be in a high school building. And, and I actually was a head football coach at Muskegon high school, which is a powerhouse.

Chris Huston (06:07.138)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (06:07.969)
And my kids went to a neighboring school at Whitehall. And so I was a head football coach at Muskegon and I was the head basketball coach at Whitehall. So I coached three of my kids in varsity basketball. so, you know, those things are like, oh, this is the greatest thing ever. Right. I get to coach my kids and in a varsity sport. So that was pretty cool. And then when the opportunity arose to be a college coach, you know, I

Chris Huston (06:18.254)
Jeez.

Tony Annese (06:36.425)
I'm like, okay, well, we'll see what happens with this, but it's been great. But I'm not a person that is always looking. It would have to be a really good situation. And truthfully, like, you know, people, people say, you know, well, why didn't you jump to the FCS? Cause you know, I mean, obviously there's a, you know, a step from here to there. Right. And so people have asked me, why don't I jump to FCS? Well,

In 2023, you know, we went to Montana and played at Montana in front of like 20, I think they broke their all time attendance record there, like 28,000 people. It's the loudest venue I've ever been. And we played them right down to the wire. And I'm like, well, Montana's an FCS school. Montana actually went to the national championship game that year. So my deduction was we're a lot.

better than a lot of FCS schools, which is probably true. so, so then I would say, okay, well, you have to take a really good job to ever leave Ferris and that really good job, in my opinion, hasn't, hasn't been there for me.

Chris Huston (07:35.415)
Yeah.

Ahem.

Chris Huston (07:49.71)
Well, it just seems like you just love coaching. You coach basketball, coach football. What is it about coaching that you love so much?

Tony Annese (07:58.731)
Well, that's how I grew up. know, I mean, I have a, you know, I have three brothers and a sister and, and that, was everything our entire existence, you know, and, so I was raised that way. Everything was competition, whether we were, you know, we were golfing together, playing basketball together, playing baseball. You know, we all played, all my brothers and I played three sports and in high school.

Chris Huston (08:10.488)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (08:28.757)
you know, and we were, you we were really close in age. So, you know, we just played sports all the time. And so my dad being a teacher and a coach, my mom being a crazy, you know, sports, you know, advocate. So that's how we grew up. And so it's still that way. Like, you know, like I'll talk to my brothers and you know, they're either, you know, golfing today or definitely, you know, turning on the TV to watch.

Chris Huston (08:47.118)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (08:57.601)
the Tigers play today or watching college football. We had a bye week the other couple of weeks ago and I couldn't wait for the bye week to sit there and watch Ole Miss play. I watched it from beginning to end and that's just the way we're built. There's nothing in our world that's more important than being a part of athletics.

Chris Huston (09:13.068)
Right?

Tony Annese (09:26.805)
You know, even if it was the US Open and tennis or the Ryder Cup and golf, mean, I'm glued to those things when I have time to be glued to them.

Chris Huston (09:36.303)
I love that. You know, you've won big everywhere you've coached. Uh, usually you have a couple of seasons and then you just start winning big, uh, at the places that you coach at. started at Ferris state in 2012, a couple of years later, 2014, you started averaging 12 wins per year since then. Uh, but it was only in 2021 that you started winning titles. You kind of got over the hump. Now you've won three of the last four. It makes me think about, uh, great John Wooden who took, I think he took 13 years.

at UCLA before he won his first national championship. And then he said that was the hardest part was learning how to win. What moved Ferris from being really good at division two to really be in a dynasty right now?

Tony Annese (10:18.945)
Yeah, that's a really interesting question. Sometimes it does take that kind of time. know, I was a high school head coach for 22 years and my first state championship was 2004, which seems like a while ago now. But, you know, I was in the business for a while as a head coach. I was a head coach when I was 26. You know, my first stop.

my was my only losing season. were four and five my first year at Montrose High School. And then we lost the first two the next year. So we were four and seven and then we won 61 regular season games in a row. So that's wild. Ike won 61 regular season games in row, but we didn't win a state championship during that whole run. You know, which is like, well, what's missing here? So, you know, that's that's a interesting thought. I just think you just stay.

stay focused, you know, in 2016, we were in the, in the semifinals in 2018, we were in the national championship game, lost 49 to 47 to Valdosta. it's like, you know, that was a heartbreaking loss, but, you just keep on working and, and, and that's the way our guys are, you know, uh, that's the way our coaches are. That's the way our players are, you know, that everybody's like, um, you know, how, how do you keep your guys focused? How do you keep them, you know, disciplined?

Chris Huston (11:17.71)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (11:45.537)
continue to, you know, be, you know, have such a high standard and not fall off. Well, if you would, if you're around here, like you wouldn't know, you wouldn't have known that we won a national championship last year. You wouldn't know that we won, you know, and, and 2021 and 2022, we don't, you know, we never like sit on our past laurels. We don't ever feel, you know, entitled. None of that stuff happens here. And part of it stems from the fact that

You know, we do have a chip on our shoulder and everything we do. Our stadium is pretty mediocre. you know, our facilities are mediocre. And I always just sell recruits on the fact that if you want to win, you know, it's pretty proven fact that we're the winningest program in all of D2 right now.

Chris Huston (12:35.03)
Yeah, for sure. I mean, it's, you don't really need the facilities if you're, if you're winning. I mean, it really kind of puts a lie to the old claim that you need facilities to win. but let's zoom a little bit on this season. You guys are five and O your rank number one, defending national champs. What would you say is the identity of this team on offense and defense? And if I walked into your Tuesday practice today, what would jump out first at me?

Tony Annese (12:59.789)
I'll answer the last question first. the level of intensity and competitiveness and practice. Like you're going to, you know, we hit the field here in an hour and 15 minutes and you're going to see like a team that just, just works at practice. Like you wouldn't believe. And that's what's really, you know, been a blessing for me. Like, I mean, I don't know how to even describe it. Like we are the.

best practice team in America. And I've been to watch Alabama. I've been to watch Michigan. I've been to watch Florida, Tennessee, you name it. I've been to a lot of college practices. We are the best practice team in America. And so you're going to see a high pace practice. You're going to see people with great intensity. You're going to see them so, so competitive. Um, you know, that, that we're competitive in the weight room, competitive, you know, and on the, on the practice field. And, and that's a big force.

and who we are. And then the first question now you would you ask is I got to go back now.

Chris Huston (14:03.533)
Just what would you say is the identity of this team on offense and defense?

Tony Annese (14:08.799)
Yeah, so we try to build it to be very physical. And so we need to win with the offensive line because that's where you win with physicality and with the defensive line. So right now we're like number one in the nation in scoring offense and total offense, both. But we run the ball very effectively. We don't just sit and run it every down.

But, you know, we're top, top five in the nation and rush yardage. And I think we're second in the nation and, and, and, stopping the run. And so those are things that, you know, you have control over how you build your system, but also, you know, what you do in the weight room, you know, and I always tell people like in 2015, we had, we had a guy by the name of Justin Zimmer who, ended up playing the NFL. so Zim in 16.

Chris Huston (14:47.469)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Huston (14:56.13)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (15:08.161)
you know, in in spring of 16, we tried to get our guys into bigger universities for pro days. So he went to the university of Michigan first pro day. And he was the last guy to get under the bench at 225 because they did it alphabetically and they, they, you know, obviously Z is the last letter in the alphabet. So they, I was there and they announced Justin Zimmer from Ferris state. And the most anybody had done is 27 at 225 and Zim got under the

bar ended up 44 times. 44 times from Ferris State. Yeah. And so that's just the way we are. That's the perfect example of who we are. know, like Zach Seeler, who was the most valuable player for the Miami, Miami Dolphins this past year. He, he was the strongest player for the, for the Dolphins, you know, you know, of anybody on the team, you know, he's strongest player on the, on the team. And so, you know, that's how we're built. And so

Chris Huston (15:37.749)
Wow, that's insane.

Tony Annese (16:05.791)
That's happened at Ferris, right? Justin Zimmer, Zach Seeler, Tavier Thomas, who plays the Vikings, know, Caleb Murphy, who broke the all-time sack record. You know, Jason Vanderlaan, who's a leading rusher in the history of college football as a quarterback. All those guys are Ferris State guys. So that's the culture you build. That's the belief system, the mentality that you build. And that's who we are. That's who we are.

Chris Huston (16:11.212)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Huston (16:29.355)
Yeah. Wow. You know, surely there must be pilgrimages from other coaching staffs, even up at the higher levels, come in to see what your secret sauce is. Are people coming to check out what you do at practice, what you do to prepare your team?

Tony Annese (16:45.845)
Yeah, we've had Division I teams here just talking X's and O's. We've also had Division I people that we travel to to ask questions. But yeah, the whole how's this happening thing is a question I have to answer a lot. the last core value, love, excuse me, the third core value, love and the fold.

I always just say the catalyst of our greatness is love. And so that's been the force that, you know, is the most powerful force that we have. Excuse me.

Chris Huston (17:26.381)
If someone's coming to ask you about this and you tell them it's love, say it's some FPS coach, are they like, no, but seriously, what's your secret?

Tony Annese (17:37.311)
No, I think they understand it. think most people understand, you know, lot of young people grow up in challenged backgrounds. They need love. Love is power. mean, love is power. You know, you can think back or anybody can think back about, all right, who are the significant people that that you love or who, you know, how does that make an impact? Like my mom and dad are people that love me a lot. My my brothers and sister are people that love me a lot.

Chris Huston (17:58.178)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (18:05.385)
and my kids and family and grandchildren now and everybody, you know, it's like when you have that kind of love and I look at my grandchildren now, I got three of them and I get to see them on a Sunday morning. mean, that's empowering. And so, you know, then you got to translate into, well, how can I empower my players to feel better about life, you know, to do great in college?

as a student athlete to do great on the field, to be validated as a player on the Ferris State football team, even if you don't play. know, like everybody's talking about Trinidad, Chambliss, know, who's, you know, I love dearly, but Trinidad, you know, Trinidad, he was here four years, you know, and so a lot of people would say, well, he should have left, you know, after second year when he didn't play or that kind of thing. No, no, that's not the way we're built, you know, and he grew every day like.

Chris Huston (19:01.111)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (19:03.477)
Like it's easy to grow when you're the man, right? When you get a million reps and, and, that's, but, but it's hard to grow when you're sitting back and not having opportunities, know, Zach Seeler, you know, is the superstar for the Miami Dolphins. It took him 30 games to play at Ferris State 30. And so, you know, a lot of young people are like, I'm out of there. I'm going to stop growing. I'm going to stop being committed.

And love is the thing that really makes people want to be a part of something great.

Chris Huston (19:35.425)
Yeah, we were actually going to speak with Trinidad Chambliss for this episode originally. We had some scheduling conflicts, so it didn't work out, but I'm still curious to hear more about him. How did you go about recruiting him, and what's it like now to see him doing so well at the FPS level for Ole Miss?

Tony Annese (19:52.437)
Well, not surprised by it. Everybody's like, are you surprised? Heck no. I'm not surprised. You know, I mean, we've had, you know, we've had NFL players just, you know, be AFC and NFC players of the week, you know? And so not surprised at all. and, very proud though, very proud, you know, it's, it's a hard thing to go through when you're, you're losing a player. lost five offensive players alone, five offensive starters to FBS schools and

Chris Huston (20:18.509)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (20:21.267)
and three starters to FBS schools on defense. And so it's hard, you know, and I'm not going to lie to you. Like some of them I felt betrayed by. It's just the nature of what you feel. But Trinidad, never felt betrayed because him and his family handled it so well. He was getting all these opportunities. We played in the national championship game in December 21st, and by December 25th, he was getting all these phone calls and people bombarding him.

and he wasn't even in the portal. I'm like, well, dude, I mean, that might be tampering, you know, who's calling you kind of deal, but people don't care, right? They got all these, representatives to, to contact, reach out. so, so, he was literally in tears by like December 27th, like coach, I don't want to leave, you know, and I said, maybe you should test the waters and see what kind of money there, there is involved. And he's like, coach, I don't want to leave. So he didn't leave. He didn't get in the portal then. And then.

Chris Huston (20:55.297)
Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Huston (21:15.639)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (21:21.043)
as time progressed, the pressure of, you know, first off, the amount of money, one to the pressure of, you know, having opportunities at the higher level. And I just said to him, said, you know, son, the biggest thing you want to think about is where can you best be in the NFL? OK. And being very honest with them, I didn't know, you know, I don't want to answer that question, because if you're the, you know, Harlan Hill Trophy winner in Division two.

Chris Huston (21:25.549)
Sure.

Tony Annese (21:49.685)
you probably got a good chance to be in the NFL. So you got that opportunity. Whereas if you go to a place, you know, a power four program and they already have their starter, this is the spring mind you, right? So you're leaving in the spring and they already have their starter. You're taking a big risk, you know, you may not play at all. And, you know, trying to bet on himself, Austin Simmons got hurt. The rest is history. You know, he's

Chris Huston (22:09.037)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (22:18.665)
obviously taken his opportunity to run with it. And I'm so proud of him for that. And I love him and love his family. And he's like family for me truthfully. he's always, they kind of quiz him in his press at conferences, like, what's different? He'll never say anything negative about Ferris. It's everything positive about Ferris. So he's handled it.

in an extraordinarily positive way and I'm really proud of him. you know, not surprised, knew we had the skill set to do it. you know, that can happen, you know, in college football at Division II level, you know, there's probably, you know, 20 to 30 guys that can do it at a very high level every year.

Chris Huston (23:07.085)
Well, he's certainly an exciting player, fun to watch. Like you mentioned, you lost a bunch of other guys. I think you had the most players leaving to go from division two to the FBS level of any team on division two. Six total, like you mentioned, you lost the two outputs of line anchors, Lawrence Hadar, Bryce George to Michigan and Iowa. You're leading linebacker, Sefa Saipiah to Western Michigan. Top back, Cannon Katzer to West Virginia, starting corner, Lento Smith to Tulsa.

That's a lot in one off season. How do you adjust to that and find a way to replace those guys so quickly?

Tony Annese (23:43.559)
Van, Tyrese Hunt Thompson to North Texas, know, Chacarbus Alexander to Jacksonville State. So, yeah, six of them, or excuse me, eight of them. Yeah, eight of them. So, I don't know, like, literally, like in the spring, I'm like, do I want to do that? Do I want to keep doing this? You know, is there, you know, is there something I should be doing different or, you know, should I just bow out, you know, because

Chris Huston (23:53.493)
Eight of them, yeah.

Chris Huston (23:58.487)
You

Chris Huston (24:05.101)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (24:13.759)
Loyalty is important to me. And when I kind of get a feeling, I can't help it, you know, have my feelings hurt a little bit. Cause I tell people, you know, I want people to feel like this is the best place on earth. And, know, hoisting that trophy, you know, three times is one of the greatest experiences of my life. And so I wanted my guys to feel like, you know, Hey, you know, there's not a dollar value you can put on being the best.

whatever it might be, you know, winning a pickleball national championship would be, you know, great or, know, whatever it is, know, shooting par on a hard course, you know, whatever it is, you know, it's all just levels of achievement, right? And so I want our guys to feel like, man, Ferris is the best place on earth, you know, but, but I get it and it's hard, our guys, you know, our guys, you know, when everybody left, our guys just, they, didn't stop growing, you know, and

Chris Huston (24:45.495)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Huston (25:12.096)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (25:13.373)
And so that's how we're built. know, our offensive line lost two players to, to, to, you know, the big 10, one to Michigan, one to Iowa, and our offensive line is better than last year. And so think about that. Yeah. So yeah, coaches don't stop coaching. Players don't stop growing, you know, and we're plugging in, you know, plugging in good players. And I feel great about what, what everybody's done so far this year.

Chris Huston (25:26.039)
Wow, you're doing something right.

Tony Annese (25:41.877)
You know, it's just a matter of not feeling sorry for yourself and continue to work.

Chris Huston (25:47.277)
Speaking of plugging in, tell me about redshirt freshman quarterback Wyatt Bauer. Off to a great start as a first year starter. We're going to talk to him a little later. What kind of future do think he has?

Tony Annese (25:57.921)
Well, I hope it stays here and a really positive situation. You know, we grow quarterbacks at an extraordinarily high level here. You know, and that's important. Our system's built to feature quarterbacks. You know, I mean, we've got an offensive system where we like to have a dual threat guy. We like to, you know, run play action passes. We got explosive plays and

He can do all those things very much similar to who we've had, you know, whether, you know, you name it Trinidad Chambliss or or my league Mitchell or or Jared Bernhardt, who played, you know, for the Falcons like in a snap after he left here. You know, there's there's just been great, you know, I this goes on on great athletes who become super quarterbacks here. And so that's that's the way he's built. He's very athletic.

Chris Huston (26:48.61)
Yeah, yeah.

Tony Annese (26:57.729)
And we coach them hard, you know, I've said this about Trinidad a lot, like Trinidad never gave an alibi, like never gave an excuse. you know, it's always, you know, I, you know, go back to the national championship game. And at the end of the third quarter, I don't know, we were probably, I had 41 to 14. At the end of the third quarter, there was a reporter, I guess I had to do an interview at the end of the third quarter and reporters asking me about, you know,

How's it going or whatever it is and I was chewing on Trinidad still, you know, it's like, wait a second, coach, you're at 41 to 14 layoff, you know, but, but Trinidad just smiles. I got you coach, you know, I got you in. And so, you know, we, we coach our guys hard and we have high expectations for them and, and why it's the same way, you know, like, like the other day, you know, I think he had five touchdown passes in the first half and one touchdown runs. So six touchdowns in the first half. And, uh,

Chris Huston (27:30.593)
Yeah.

Tony Annese (27:56.041)
you get to the film and, you know, it's like, okay, you know, you made like 12 mistakes in the first half, dude, you know, and, he owns it all, you know, and so that's the way it is. It's not, you're the superstar, you know, we can kind of ignore your mistakes. It's always critiquing, always trying to grow, you know, Jason Vanderlaan, who was a two-time Harlan Hill trophy winner here. He came back and talked to our team. And he said,

Chris Huston (28:12.162)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (28:24.353)
We were talking about leadership and he said that I had to sit here in this seat, which is the front row of the auditorium. He goes, I had to sit there. And after we just whipped an opponent, you know, get, get like coached hard by coaching knees. And I never made an excuse. And that's just the way it is when you're the bass, you got to constantly, you know, still continue to grow because you know, the best isn't really your full potential. The best is only what you showed on that day. And so.

Chris Huston (28:52.109)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (28:52.767)
That's kind of how wide it is too. We've been able to, you know, really grow here in the last, you know, since game one, you know, but he was also had the luxury of taking almost all the spring ball reps, which is he right. His Trinidad was still here, but he had a minor procedure and is growing. So he was out. Carson Galker was had a lot of quarterbacking it at this place. He had a season in energy that

the fall before, and so he was limited in spring ball. Chase Carter was our second string quarterback last year. Once Carson got hurt, he had surgery on his shoulder. So it was like, okay, Wyatt, here you go. And he took a ton of reps and continued to grow into spring.

Chris Huston (29:41.889)
Division two was created sort of as a kind of a middle ground between division three, which has no scholarships and FBS and FCS. There are 36 scholarships, right? For, for your program. Yeah. What resource gap do you think matters the most at your level? Is it staff sized and IL recovery travel? If you could close just one of those gaps tomorrow, which one do you think would add? I don't know how many more wins you could add, but which one would really help the program the most?

Tony Annese (29:52.149)
Yeah, correct. Yes.

Tony Annese (30:09.493)
No, that's an incredible question. So my biggest criticism of NIL is it's still kind of a elitist circumstance, right? So who's the best guy? We got to give them the most money, you know? Well, that doesn't help all student athletes. So if we're talking about, you know, compensation for college student athletes, and we're talking about, you know, like

Chris Huston (30:18.443)
Hmm.

Tony Annese (30:36.809)
a level of equity. Okay. What's, what's, what's the gymnast getting or what's the volleyball player getting or what's the soccer player getting or what's the D two or D three football player getting, nothing. Okay. Nothing like nothing. And so if we really wanted to help, and I don't care about like, you know, revenue sharing and, giving the best players, you know, more money, but how about giving the players at this level? Let's just say you give them

I don't care, maybe $4,000 a semester. I mean, that's $8,000 for every student athlete. That's fair. That's really helping all student athletes. So I've got players that don't eat, literally don't eat. And then I walk into some of these places where I go and see what they're eating. yeah, it's horrible.

Chris Huston (31:10.004)
Mm-hmm, some kind of stipend.

Chris Huston (31:30.346)
Yeah, it's crazy.

Tony Annese (31:35.446)
You know, so maybe, maybe some of my guys left because you're like, coach, you know, like I, I get to get this buffet every day, three days a week or four days a week, or I don't mean three times a day. meant to say, you know, they, get to eat like Kings. Yeah. And coach, don't, I don't eat all that much at Ferris cause I don't have that kind of money, you know? Cause if you take 36 scholarships, I'm doing my best to make everybody feel good, but it's not easy, right? Your, money gets spread out.

Chris Huston (32:03.809)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (32:05.249)
And, and, and it's challenging. So if, if I could say, okay, NIL, it's super players deserve to get paid, you know, but, take a chunk of money and give it to every athlete because I don't know how much, you know, the soccer players are getting and give it to every athlete, you know, and what it, what it is, you know, whatever it is, it's $3,000 a year. I don't care. You know, just focus how many

Chris Huston (32:22.934)
Mm-hmm.

Tony Annese (32:32.445)
athletes there are across all sports through all divisions in the NCAA and give them $3,000 a year. And that my guys would be like, yeah, my gosh, I mean, I can use that for a meal plan because some of my guys don't even have meal plans.

Chris Huston (32:34.764)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Huston (32:47.02)
Wow, do you pretty much divide up the 36 scholarships evenly between offense and defense?

Tony Annese (32:52.841)
No, we do it based upon like, you know, what kind of other scholarships a guy has. Cause cause you know, like, like Chase Carter from Edgewater, Florida, Edgewater High School in Orlando, Florida. Yeah. So Chase, Chase came here and he had a merit scholarship, merit based scholarship that was paid for all his tuition. Cause this, you know, he had an unbelievable SAT score and great grades.

Chris Huston (32:58.977)
Got it.

Chris Huston (33:05.492)
I know that high school.

Tony Annese (33:19.849)
And so we took that and then we give Chase a little bit more to try to cover his costs or somebody might have Pell Grant money. try to take that and yeah, yeah. So we break it up in the best way possible to try to cover as many of the total costs we can.

Chris Huston (33:26.614)
So you can do partial scholarships. Good.

Chris Huston (33:36.022)
Got it. Well, coach, I really appreciate you letting me into the fold, so to speak, to see what Ferris State does up close. Good luck this Saturday against Wayne State. And thanks again for letting our listeners know what's going on at D2 football, what's going on at one of the great powerhouses in college football today, and really letting us know just what a winter looks like.

Tony Annese (34:00.041)
Yeah, no, I appreciate you having me on Chris. I appreciate it.

Chris Huston (34:03.095)
Thank you. All right. Coach, that was really great. Let's just make sure you're uploaded here. One second.

Tony Annese (34:06.731)
Right, okay.