Karnes City has tabbed Daniel Oelschlegel as the next man to lead their football program as he was announced as the new head football coach and athletic director at the school on Thursday night.
Oelschlegel has served as the offensive coordinator at Richland High School the past five seasons and will replace Jim Wood who stepped down last month but will remain with the district in a different capacity. Wood had been the head coach since 2011 and led the Badgers to a 5-5 record last season.
“It means the world to me that [Karnes City ISDSuperintendent Hector] Madrigal and the Karnes City school board took a chance on me in leading the turnaround of the program,” Oelschlegel said. “I know that we are going to do great things not just as a football program, but as an entire athletic program.”
Oelschlegel has been involved in football for much of his life. He played at Corpus Christi Calallen High School, where he graduated from in 2004. He then went on to serve as a recruiting assistant at Texas A&M for four seasons under both Dennis Franchione and Mike Sherman. After this, he joined the coaching staff at Texas A&M-Kingsville where he coached tight ends, the offensive line, and running backs during his tenure from 2010-2014. He then had a one year stint at Bryan Rudder before he joined Richland, where he has been since 2015.
Oelschlegel is tasked with taking over a Karnes City program that has not made the playoffs since 2015 and has not won a playoff game since they went 10-2 back in 2014.
Karnes City will face an entirely new slate of district opponents this season after the school dropped down from 3A Division I to 3A Division 2 due to enrollment changes. This means they will square off against Dilley, George West, Natalia, Nixon Smiley, Poth, and Stockdale in district play this year, all of whom except Dilley were playoff teams last season.
Oelschlegel says his goal with the program will be to be “building champions in life through athletics.”
“We will be championship minded in everything we do from on the field, to in the classroom, to how we carry ourselves in the community,” Oelschlegel said. “We will do this by bringing discipline, energy, effort and passion into everything that we do.”
On the football field, Oelschlegel will have to replace Karnes City’s starting quarterback from last year, Braden Bowen, but plenty of talent does return elsewhere on the team. Two-way star Aaron Smith, who was named first team all-district at wide receiver and second team all-district at cornerback as a junior last year, is back as are running back Jaden Jaramillo and fullback Christian Jimenez, who both saw snaps in the backfield last season.
Defensively, Kolby Culpepper, a first team selection at linebacker last season, returns along with second team selections defensive lineman Ryland Wieding and linebacker Jacob Peralta. All three are seniors this year and, along with Smith, will give Oelschlegel plenty of experience to work with on the defensive side of the ball.
Oelschlegel and Karnes City will open their season when they host Kenedy, a team the Badgers have defeated in the past seven season openers, dating back to 2013, as they will look to return to the playoffs for the first time in five years.
