Rayne Urech, Plano teen, dreams of coaching football defies odds

Huddled across the kitchen island in her Plano residence, Misty Urech and her daughters put together dinner on a Wednesday night time.

Dinner time is sacred within the Urech family, even whether it is organized chaos.

An meeting line of forks and knives to the soundtrack of highschool gossip and inside jokes.

In the entranceway, their foster canine and one of its puppies pitter-patter on the hardwood flooring.

“One day at a time,” Misty replied, when requested how she juggles every part beneath the roof. “Sometimes it’s one breath at a time.

Misty finds peace between the pages of a ebook. Dozens of them line the cabinets of the lounge. Leather sure. Hardcover. Tall spines. Paperbacks. Encyclopedias. Art books. Squeezed subsequent to at least one one other. No room for bookends. No want for them

The dinner desk is the place the Urechs unite to debate their days and their lives.

No matter is out-of-bounds. No decibel is unattainable.

As they plan out their routes for the subsequent day’s comings and goings, an empty eating room chair rests peacefully at one head of the desk.

Misty and her husband, Bowman Urech, met on a blind date in Houston, at a bookstore.

He was an engineer. She was smitten. Before lengthy, they’d marry and convey 4 ladies into the world: Julianne, River, Skye and Rayne.

Bowman was usually on the highway for work, as a revered skilled within the oil and fuel trade.

On May 6, 2019, he was in west Texas. In the late afternoon, 50 miles west of San Angelo, Texas, Bowman died in a automobile accident. He was 60 years previous.

“We talk about it a lot, “ Misty explained. “We don’t make it a taboo subject. I’m not one to hide from it. It’s our reality. [The daughters] had to grow up really quick.”

Rayne discovered peace between the pages of a pocket book.

“If the house catches on fire, she will grab her notebooks and her cat — probably in that order,” Misty stated.

Nearly a dozen of them, in a tough white cowl, line the singular shelf behind Rayne’s bed room desk.

“Specific notebook, specific pens she uses,” Misty added. “Just like her dad. He only liked a particular pen.”

Barely legible notes and drawings engulf almost each web page from prime to backside.

Formations. Strategies. Written by hand.

Because Rayne needs to change into a football coach.

“I love getting up early and going to practice. I love coming home and watching film. I just love working on football. I love writing about it. I love talking to people about it. It’s all I do. It’s all I talk about. It’s my personality,” stated Rayne. 

When requested in regards to the notebooks, she replied, “I needed something a coach could hold and see and be like, ‘She knows football.’ I could never walk into practice and be like, ‘I want to coach. Just let me coach. Please!’”

Rayne and her sisters grew up cheering for LSU as a result of of Misty and her Louisiana household ties. They pull for the New Orleans Saints, too.

“If you had asked me three years ago, ‘What’s a 4-3 defense?’ I would’ve been like, ‘a-what?'” Rayne joked. “But now I’m like, ‘Oh 4-3? So basic.'”

Nearly a 12 months after her father’s loss of life, Rayne’s informal watching of football morphed into an obsession.

“Football she got from me but her way of organizing, seeing things, being able to look at a field and strategize and watch all the players and put all that in place — she gets all that from her dad,” Misty stated. “When you look at her notes, you’ll see. She is, without a doubt, an engineer’s daughter.”

Alan Klein vividly remembers seeing Rayne’s notes for the primary time.

“A spiral pocket book full of defenses that she studied,” Alan detailed, a teacher and head football coach at Haggard Middle School. “She wished to name a blitz ‘Flower’ as a result of ‘it’s nonetheless gonna be fairly.'”

Alan instantly acknowledged Rayne’s ardour for coaching and nurtured it by making a spot on the workforce for her as a pupil assistant coach.

“While they’re practicing playing, I’m practicing coaching,” Rayne summarized.

“She knew more than a lot of coaches I had been around,” Alan admitted. “One time, she told me our linebacker has his eyes inside. The outside receiver is hooking him in, we’re losing contain and they’re running to the outside every time. And I was like, ‘Wow, you’re right.’ And I didn’t even see it at that point.”

Alan took on a mentor and father-figure function for Rayne, who was in eighth grade on the time.

“She wrote me this letter, at the end of the year, telling me I helped give her lessons that her father would have done, had he been around,” Alan recalled fondly.

X’s and O’s should not the one letters Rayne cherishes.

Instead of posters or no matter youngsters use to embellish their bed room partitions, Rayne’s room is adorned with framed letters from NFL and faculty football coaches.

Dallas Cowboys defensive coordinator Dan Quinn despatched Rayne a diagram of one of his favourite blitzes. Kansas City Chiefs defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo shared one of his as nicely. And there is a letter from Saints head coach Dennis Allen providing phrases of encouragement.

“I love getting up early and going to practice,” Rayne started. “I love coming home and watching film. I just love working on football. I love writing about it. I love talking to people about it. It’s all I do. It’s all I talk about. It’s my personality.”

In a particular spot on the wall, and in her coronary heart, hangs a letter from Baylor football coach Dave Aranda. The former LSU defensive coordinator is, by far, Rayne’s favourite coach at any degree of football.

“So cool,” Rayne shrieks, unable to comprise her enthusiasm.

Soon, extra letters will observe.

“She’s part of our recruiting list of potential prospects,” stated Todd Ford, head football coach at Plano Senior High School. “She’s going to be popular. She’s going to be someone that’s wanted at the collegiate level.”

College continues to be two and a half years away. Rayne is a sophomore at Vines High School (grades 9 and 10). Next 12 months, she’ll ascend to Plano Senior (grades 11 and 12).

“She’s already had one [college] try to recruit her,” Misty added. “She’s had several others talk to her.”

After two years helping on the center faculty degree, Todd elevated Rayne to the varsity degree in 2022 to be a pupil assistant coach for the Plano Senior football workforce.

“She’s one of us,” Todd declared. “She’s a part of our staff. A part of our program. And her family is as well.”

“I was realistic with her,” Misty acknowledged. “‘You do know this is Texas? This is Friday Night Football. This is very much a ‘boys club.’ Is this really what you wanna do?'”

While she had fears of being taken significantly, Rayne accepted and embraced her new function. It was a possibility to look at and take up coaching in Texas highschool football, which is extra severe and intensive than many small faculty packages within the nation.

“I feel like I have a lot to prove,” Rayne began. “Not only to the people around me but to anybody. I feel like I represent any other female coach. And if there’s one bad female coach, they might not take the next one.”

Rayne’s dream job is to be a defensive coordinator within the SEC. Though, she might have loftier targets in 10 to twenty years.

“She knows it, she gets it and she understands it,”  Todd asserted. “It’s the beginning of a journey, the way I see it.”

There are feminine assistant coaches within the NFL and faculty football equivalent to Jennifer King, Katie Sowers and Lori Locust.

However, there has by no means been a feminine coordinator or head coach at both degree.

“It is very rare,” Alan nodded. “But you’re starting to see it more and more often and ceilings are broken… But we have to foster that.”

While the odds could also be stacked in opposition to her like books on her lounge cabinets, Rayne and her sisters have defied percentages since start.

Julianne, River, Skye and Rayne are quadruplets.

Julianne, affectionately referred to as Juju, competes in Special Olympics and rides equestrian. River performs volleyball and works within the athletic coaching division. Skye is a gifted gymnast.

While the sisters have distinctive pursuits and personalities, athletics, genetics and the dinner desk bind the Urech gals collectively.

So, if there’s somebody to beat the odds as a feminine football coach — Rayne Urech is able to write that chapter within the historical past books.

“She’s trail-brazed the whole thing,” Misty stated. “I simply drive together with her… and the notebooks.