LCHS Football holds intrasquad
‘Meet the Railers’ scrimmage
[August 17, 2026]
LINCOLN -- It was a day of firsts for the LCHS Railer football
program at the annual “Meet the Railers” held Friday evening.
The occasion opened with a ribbon-cutting ceremony to commemorate
the newly-installed all-weather turf at Handlin Field. Read more
about the ribbon-cutting event here.
The event also marked the public Railer coaching “debut” of Aaron
Fricke as football head coach in overseeing the scrimmage. Fricke,
an LCHS alum, enters his first year at the helm of the Railer
program after leading the Warrensburg-Latham football program,
compiling a 35-37 record over eight seasons. Fricke’s W-L teams made
the IHSA playoffs twice during his tenure, advancing to the
quarterfinals in both 2018 and 2024.
Fricke takes over a program that managed a 1-8 record last season,
the tenth year under Matt Silkowski. Silkowski compiled a 28-60
overall record in his decade leading the Railers and took LCHS to a
playoff appearance in 2023, the team’s first playoff game since
1984.
While supporters in attendance got to see the new football field as
part of the ceremonies, the scrimmage was not held on the new field
as the installation was not quite complete. After the fall LCHS
athletic teams were introduced, the football team then made its way
to its practice field, to the west and directly behind the home
bleachers. Some fans stood atop the bleachers and watched, and other
brought lawn chairs to sit near the practice field sidelines and
observe the action.
While Fricke said the setting for the scrimmage harkened back to his
Railer football playing days a bit, the atmosphere wasn’t exactly
what he thought it would be due to the change in venue for the
scrimmage.
“It was weird to do ‘Meet the Railers’ on the practice field,”
Fricke said. “We usually always had a scrimmage the next morning
after ‘Meet the Railers’ with Coach Oakes, so we would be out here
actually doing live tackling, so it had a little bit of that feel.
“But then all the people that were around; that was a different
feeling. It was awesome to see everything we put together and see
the kids compete. I loved the effort, I loved the way they
communicated. The referees were complimenting their sportsmanship
that we talked a little bit before. I’m just really proud of them
already.”
While Lincoln’s 2023 playoff appearance was celebrated throughout
the community, getting a taste of postseason football naturally made
it that much more desired. While any coach would love for his team
to regularly appear in the postseason, Fricke said he’s keeping the
goals for his first Railer team fairly simple.
“It’s going to be very simple,” Fricke said. “This is not a box you
can just always check, and it's hard to measure, but fighting. We
fight until the end. We've talked about gladiators in the arena.
I'll be showing them ‘300’ [the movie] at some point and that last
battle scene. But they have to get that mentality, because we know
it's an uphill battle. But if you fight every single night, and you
just keep competing, eventually we're going to turn the corner.
“And I think that's the problem: you can’t set unrealistic goals.
You can’t go in there and tell them you’re going to go 9-and-0. But
they have games that they can win, and if they just fight, we're
going to be in a lot of those games. So you’ve just got to keep it
simple and keep that culture going.”
[to top of second column] |
On the subject of culture, Fricke said he challenged his players to
compete with a supportive attitude toward teammates and a cool head
on the field, and he liked what he saw during the scrimmage.
“I think there was a little bit of a reputation last year of us
losing our temper sometimes, some unsportsmanlike penalties,” Fricke
said. “I said I don't care how frustrated you get. I mean, there's
going to be people right next to us, and I don't care if we’re out
on the field. Those little things, the discipline there, I want to
make sure that we take care of real quick. And they met the
challenge. There wasn’t one bad word uttered out here, which is a
first for me around some of these high school programs.”
In addition to culture, Fricke said he will continue to work to
raise the number of participants in the football program.
“I'm always going to probably set the bar a little higher than I
should,” he said. “I told them I wanted to get to 60; we’re at like
55 or 56 right now. Next year then, I'm going to want to get to 70.
The tough part was we haven’t really started school yet. I had
freshman today. I'm hoping Monday, even some kids if they come out
late, we’re going to let them do that within the first few weeks.
“The recruiting will never stop though. In season, out of season; if
I see a kid that could help, I will be there in his ear all along.
The ones we have out here though, they’re an absolutely great core.
It might not be the numbers exactly that I wanted, but it's more
than I think what they finished and we’re heading in the right
direction.”
While talking about numbers, Fricke added that Lincoln’s youth
football league can be a valuable pipeline in helping improve the
number of football participants at the high school level. However,
in order for that ripple effect to take place, he said that such
programs must have the proper emphasis.
“We talked about this other day: the numbers in football around a
lot of schools have dropped, and everybody think his because parents
and it’s the injuries and concussions. I don't actually agree with
that; I think it's toxic JFL coaches. I think in youth sports in
general, we've got a lot of people out there that care more about
winning than developing the kids.
“And that’s what we emphasize to our JFL coaches: if we want to come
out in Lincoln, they have to enjoy football. Which, part of that is
winning, but even still, we want them to love football. And that was
the No. 1 thing I stressed to them. Because doesn't matter if you
second grade, third grade, seventh grade, it doesn't matter: if they
have a bad experience right off the bat, then they're not going to
like football so that's another..that's a big, big piece of the
puzzle right there.”
The Railers are scheduled to open their season on August 21 in a
non-conference game at home against Peoria Manual starting at 7 PM.
Meet the Railers event
kicks off 2026 LCHS Football Season video
[Loyd Kirby] |
