Keith Tandy before a recent Tampa Bay Buccaneers practice. [Tampa Bay Buccaneers photo]
Keith Tandy has played in big games before. Sunday, the Christian County High alum will get to coach in one.
Tandy is in his first season as special teams and assistant defensive coach for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers who play Kansas City Sunday in Super Bowl LV.
Tandy coaches Tampa’s punt teams. His specialty is the gunners on punts. The gunner is the player who runs down the sidelines to try and tackle the punt returner. Since there are usually two players assigned to a gunner, Tandy has to teach them techniques to shed the blocker.
He also has to flip to punt return and coach his players on how to stop the other team’s gunner.
Tandy also has in-week scouting duties and prep work.
“I have to do write-ups on each special teams player on the other team and how they play on each punt special teams phase whether its punt, punt return, kickoff, kickoff return, field goal, and field goal block,” Tandy said Thursday in a phone interview from Tampa.
Tandy played six years in the NFL for Tampa Bay and one season with Atlanta, becoming known for his tenacity and ability to make big plays on both defense and special teams.
Now, he is trying to take what he has learned and apply it to his special teams group.
“We’ve been hammering on fundamentals, making sure everyone understands the concepts that we try to install each and every day and making sure we keep emphasizing those and making sure everyone does their part,” Tandy said. “Definitely, one man can’t get it done by himself so you want to make sure everyone is doing their part to force the return the way you want it to go and get them on the ground.”
Tandy’s venture into coaching began in 2019 after he was released by the Falcons.
“I was still trying to play and staying in shape. One of my former coaches at Tampa Bay was coaching at a high school [Bishop McLaughlin] and asked me to come talk to his kids. I told them I wanted to be a coach in the future but still wanted to play in the NFL,” Tandy recounted. “He asked me to help coach them while I waited for a call from the NFL.”
The call from an NFL team never came, and Tandy spent the full season helping coach at Bishop McLaughlin.
In March of last year, Tandy got his call from the NFL – to be a coach instead of a player. He joined the Bucs as a special teams’ assistant under Keith Armstrong, his former special teams coach in Atlanta.
Tandy said the thought of becoming a coach can be traced back to his high school days at Christian County with Coach Mike Whitaker.
“I always thought of myself as a cerebral player when I was on the field, and I always had coaches that challenged me from a young age dating back to little league or high school. Coach Whittaker at Christian County would have me coming in early and watching film. I could call some of my own plays. I had the ability to make audibles and checks at the line of scrimmage. I think that got me ready to be a coach and see the game in a different way,” Tandy said.
Tandy threw for over 3,284 yards as a senior at Christian County and still has his name etched in the record book in many categories.
He was an All-Conference defensive back at West Virginia before he was selected in the sixth round of the 2012 NFL Draft by Tampa Bay.
When asked what brought more anxiety – coaching in the Super Bowl or the days leading up to the NFL Draft – Tandy said the latter.
“I didn’t know what was going to happen before the draft. I didn’t know if I was going to get drafted. I didn’t have any idea. With the Super Bowl, I know we’re going to pay this week. I know we’re going to play Kansas City,” he said.
But there are still some butterflies heading into Super Bowl LV.
“I’ve been calm this week. Every now and then I get butterflies, but I just go back to work, watch more film, and study my notes a little more and those go away.”
Big games and butterflies are nothing new for Tandy. His grand slam helped Christian County win a 2006 semi-state baseball game. He started for the Colonels in the Sweet 16 that same year at Rupp Arena, scoring 19 points and grabbing 12 rebounds in a loss to Shelby County.
He’s played in and won bowl games while at West Virginia. And of course, there are the games he played under the bright lights of the NFL.
Despite the big game experience, there are always butterflies for Tandy.
“When I played, I got butterflies before every game I played in life. Little league, high school, college, NFL, baseball, basketball. My way to get rid of them was to go hit someone and get that out of my system so I was good,” Tandy said.
This year’s Super Bowl won’t have the pageantry of previous years due to COVID-19 restrictions that mean a smaller crowd and less travel. The travel isn’t a factor for the Buccaneers who are the first team to play the Super Bowl in its home stadium.
Tandy said the Super Bowl feels like a regular-season game with the nights spent at home and the short drive to the practice complex.
He said it’s definitely been a different year for the coaches and players who have continually guard against contracting the coronavirus.
“You don’t want to hang out with the guys on the team. If one person gets it, you have 5, 6, 10 guys out just like that. The players have mostly spent time with their immediate family or by themselves. I think it made them lonely and made them more excited to come to work.”
Tampa Bay lost to Kansas City 27-24 on Nov. 29 but have won seven straight games since.
Tandy said it helps having already seen the Chiefs play in person when devising the special teams game plan.
“It always helps to play a team a second time. We have seen their speed, so there is no ‘whoa’ moment during a game,” he said.
Tandy may be in his first season as an NFL coach, but he has already mastered one element – coachspeak, especially when asked about the keys to getting a Super Bowl win.
“We have to execute our game plan. If we do what we have been doing all year, we will have a chance to win the game.”
Chance. It’s something that Keith Tandy has capitalized on at every stop of his athletic career, and Sunday’s Super Bowl gives him another layer to one of the most impressive sports resumes in Christian County history.
