This past week we hosted our annual Mom’s Night. Five seasons ago I hosted our first Mom’s Night and it was one of the most positive events that I’ve ever been a part of in coaching. Over the past few years we’ve continued this tradition in our program and while we’ve tweaked the program from year to year to keep things fresh, it’s continued to be a popular night with our moms and players. When I first started planning our M
om’s Night, I tried to research what other teams were doing. I know that a lot of teams host them but, it was hard to find examples and ideas for our event. In writing this, I hope I can offer some ideas and direction so that you can plan your own event.
When to Host Your Event–Originally we held our Mom’s Night on the Wednesday of Homecoming. I liked having it during Homecoming Week for a few reasons. For those of us who have a lot going on during Homecoming that serves to distract your players, I think having a night that is really about family, is a calming and focussing experience for the team. Holding it later in the season also allows our players and moms to have a more reflective frame of mind as they realize that regardless of the success of the team, that all of this will soon be over. I also appreciate having the feel of fall with the cool crisp evening as we are out under the lights at the end of the evening.
However, due to conflicts with Homecoming this past year, I decided to move our Mom’s Night to before the first game. Doing this allowed us to have a little variety in what we presented to the moms and allowed us to focus more on setting a tone for the season rather than reflecting on it. We’ve done it both ways now and really it’s been great either way.
Agenda for the Evening–Since this year’s event was early in the season, I took the opportunity to share with our moms some things that I felt were important for them to hear as well as some things that I know they were interested in.
- Welcome and Introductions–I like to have an opportunity to introduce our coaches and have the moms put a
name with a face. I also used this opportunity to talk with our moms about our core values and what they mean to us and how we selected them. - Concussion Prevention and Injury Protocols–We are very lucky to have one of the best ATC/R’s in the business at our school. She presented the protocols we have for injuries and treatments as well as those specifically for concussions. I followed up by sharing the steps we take to keep our players safe.
- Sports Nutrition–I brought in two local business owners (one of whom was a former player) to talk about nutrition and performance. I actually have an assistant coach who is qualified to talk about this but I felt it would be more impactful coming from an outside voice. This presentation resulted in a lot of good questions from the parents and was good to set up our later conversation regarding team meals.
- Officials Presentation–We brought in another alumnus who is now a college and high school official to talk about what football officials do. He had a great message for the parents about why our officials do what they do and what exactly their job is. I asked our guest to talk about the difference between NFHS and College/NFL rules. He gave about five examples where coaches and the fans confuse what the high school rule is with what they watch on TV.
- Parent Booster Presentation–Finally, we had a parent representative who is in charge of heading up our
team meals talk about what the plan was for this season and what the organizer’s initial plan was. I also talked about the history of our pregame and travel meals and how we’ve changed things over time and why. - Mom’s Gear–This year I purchased some t-shirts for our moms. We asked for a $10 donation for them and they were very popular with the ladies! This is the first year we’ve done this and we’ll definitely try to do it again next year.
In past year’s I’ve given presentations to the moms about our offense or defense. Particularly popular is calling plays 
or our no-huddle system. I have a presentation called, “10 Things your Husband doesn’t know about Football,” which goes over all the obscure rules left in the NFHS rule book. All of these are fun and aimed at giving the moms insight into what we do on a daily basis.
All of this leads up to the part that I think is the most popular with the moms–our facility tour. We have the players take their moms through our facility and then out onto the field to throw the ball around and see what it’s like to be on the game field under the lights. I highly recommend your players show them their lockers and let them try on their gear. This is always a highlight for the moms and we usually have a few that come out onto the field in their son’s helmet and shoulder pads to play catch.
The final part of the night is when we finish on the game field. If you do the event later in the fall, you get to turn on the lights and it is a great setting. We have had our players run drills with their moms or just throw the ball around with their moms. This year, I had the boys teach their mom’s the school fight song as well as a team song we sing after wins or when the occasion calls for it.
I hope that this has given you some ideas to use with your program. Regardless, I highly recommend you hold one of these events for your program this season.