Russell Morgan is bringing big goals to a small town.

Morgan was introduced as the new Chattahoochee County High School head football coach after spending the past two years as an assistant at Greene County in Greensboro, Ga.

From 2003 to 2008, he was head coach at longtime state power Washington-Wilkes. Morgan said he prefers the small-town atmosphere — things are simple and everyone loves the same team.

“I like the fact everybody knows everybody,” Morgan said. “When a teacher sees a student walking down the hall, they know if they’re a football player. It makes it easier to keep a handle on things and know what’s going on.”

Morgan arrived in takes over a Chattahoochee County team that finished with a 4-6 record in 2010 after successful seasons in 2008 and 2009. The football program only began in 2006.

“It seems like they’ve started off a lot quicker than most startup programs,” Morgan said. “Usually programs struggle 10 or 12 years … they’ve done a good job here in the past … hopefully, we can take what’s been laid here and build on it and climb higher.

“I’ve been pretty impressed with the talent levels. There are some areas that we’re going to have to improve in to get better, but I believe the nucleus is here to have a very good program.”

Morgan coached in several state title games in his 21 years at Washington Wilkes, where he spent 15 years as an assistant coach. As a head coach, his record was 45-26-1.

Morgan said he believes a successful program is built on fundamentals and teaching character to his players.

“The two things I look to build my programs on are: kids doing things the right way … and do it as hard as you can do it,” he said. “I don’t preach we have to win this game or that game, I preach if we do what we do as hard as we can do it, it’s hard to lose. If we can get the character and work ethic right, the winning takes care of itself.

“At Washington, I don’t think (the head coach) ran but six running plays and four passing plays. Everybody knew what we were doing before we did, but they couldn’t stop it because it was done right.”

Morgan said he will use a hybrid offense consisting of an I-formation and a spread formation to keep opposing defenses off balance. But as the team learns his system, his real focus will be defense.

“We believe in putting pressure on people,” he said. “We will be bringing the heat.”

Morgan called his new position the most interesting job he’s had in his career. Most of that is due to adjusting to a high school that supports a significant chunk of military Families.

“I’ve never been at a school that had so much of a transition of kids coming and going,” he said. “I probably have three or four messages every day from a new kid interested in football. I would rather it be that way than the opposite.”

Morgan said he also realizes with a small roster, the possibility of a player leaving at any time is something he may have to deal with.

“You’ve got to be able to adjust and overcome adversity and make the best of it,” he said. “If somebody goes down or moves, we have to have someone else step in.”

Morgan said he dealt with an injury-plagued season in 2005 at Washington-Wilkes, but still ended up playing for the state championship.

“We lost seven (players in) starting positions,” he said. “For a 1A school to lose seven (starters) and still go to the state championship, in my opinion, was pretty impressive. We constantly had someone all year to move up.”

As a head coach, Morgan said he has never missed the state playoffs and doesn’t intend to this year. However, his emphasis will be on laying fundamentals.

“More than building for the season, I’m building for the program,” he said. “A lot of people try to build teams for the season. You may be good one year but terrible next year. I want to build a program where every year we can compete.”