BY DANIEL SCHMIDT FOR THE OBSERVER

SMITHS STATION — The call came in April, much later in the school year than a newly hired head coach normally receives. The Smiths Station High School football team was in dire straits and needed a steady hand to step in and guide the program out of arguably its darkest days in history. From the outside looking in, Blair Harrison was walking into one of the most unenviable situations in Alabama high school athletics, months behind schedule after previous head coach Justin Albert resigned just 42 days after he was hired. Since June 3 — his first official day as head coach — Harrison has had one goal for the job that checked the majority of his boxes as he sought a return to coaching: stabilize the bleeding. Even though he already had experience turning ar

See Full Page