Back in the game

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Christian Schweers thought he’d never be back at Mountain Brook.

“Now that I’ve come back, I feel like I’m a much better coach, getting to go out and do the things that I got to do the last two years at Cornerstone,” he said.

Schweers was named the first head boys basketball coach and athletics director at Cornerstone School in Birmingham in 2014 after spending five years as an assistant coach at Mountain Brook.

His two years at Cornerstone were a great learning experience, but circumstances beyond his control pushed him out of his first high school head-coaching job.

Last December, Schweers was diagnosed with melanoma. That was right around the time the high school basketball season begins to kick into gear, as teams begin preparing for area play. But he said he wasn’t going to let that stop him.

Schweers was determined to fight through whatever he had to. He said he vividly remembers having surgery one morning and coaching a game that night.

“I get home, and I’ve got blood through my shirt,” he said. “I was going to give everything I could to those kids at Cornerstone. I just loved them to death.”

The health issue compounded by other family concerns would catch up to Schweers and push him toward resigning from Cornerstone. After a skin graft, he was knocked out of commission for three months, something way out of his comfort zone.

“Doctors wouldn’t let me do anything and that was really difficult. As somebody that’s used to doing something all the time and being busy…That’s just really hard,” he said.

Bring him back

Following Mountain Brook’s loss at the buzzer to Gadsden City in the Northeast Regional Semifinals last season, Spartan head coach Bucky McMillan was restless. He wasted no time getting his program in gear for 2016-17.

McMillan woke up early the morning after the game and made a call to Schweers to gauge his interest in returning to the program. That sounds normal on its face, until the circumstances are considered.

“He doesn’t ever get up early in the morning,” Schweers said about McMillan. “He’s a night owl. Literally the morning after, 8 [a.m.], he called me and starts talking about coming back here.

“That just meant a lot to me and showed me how serious he was about me coming back and joining the staff.”

Schweers said he saw all of the pieces falling into place; the signs pointing there and the right doors opening up for a return to the Spartans.

“I am unbelievably excited. I can’t express how excited I am to be back here. It feels different than it was before, but life just kind of happened to me,” he said.

McMillan said he has no doubt Schweers will fit right in again at Mountain Brook, and their personal camaraderie makes matters easier.

“It’s great. Not only is Christian a great coach, but he knows Mountain Brook really well, and he knows me really well,” McMillan said.

Back to work

Now that Schweers is back, he will do much of the same as before he took the job at Cornerstone. He will handle much of the basketball operations, scheduling, uniforms and program organization from top to bottom.

As far as coaching, Schweers will be a co-head coach of the ninth-grade squad along with Dave Good and an assistant with the varsity team.

“I’m glad to be doing a lot with the freshman team because it allows me to continue to grow as a coach and go through practice every day,” he said. “A lot of time, assistant coaches don’t get that opportunity and until you have your own team, you don’t really get those reps as a coach.”

Another thing that makes working with the freshman team appealing is the relationships Schweers said he can establish with his players, something even more important now than it was in his first stint at Mountain Brook.

He admits in the past he may have been too focused on the wins and losses, but now success is defined by what he can teach players.

“There’s only two things you control in life, and that’s the same two things you control on the basketball court. It’s your attitude and your effort. That’s what I’m about in this situation, and life has taught me that, and that’s the same thing I’m trying to teach these guys,” he said.

Schweers said he is glad to be back, and thinks the 2016-17 version of the Spartans can do big things.

“If we can stay healthy and stay hungry, I have no doubt in my mind we’ll be right there at the end,” he said.