Brownwood Lions head football coach Jeryl Brixey on Wednesday announced that Steve Fanara is the latest addition to the coaching staff, as he will serve as defensive coordinator for the 2025 campaign.
Fanara – a former Howard Payne head coach and Brownwood and Early assistant – joins offensive coordinator Jacob Marwitz – former head coach at De Leon – and offensive line coach Lee Grimes, a Brownwood graduate with both college and high school coaching experience, as confirmed members of the staff.
Fanara, currently at Round Rock McNeil, coached the defensive line and linebackers in the past at Austin Vandegrift, the 2024 Class 6A Division II state champion which runs the odd front, monster three-high safety look Brixey wants to implement.
“I’m excited about him because he’s very knowledgeable about what we’re doing,” Brixey said of Fanara. “It’s a three down, but not the traditional 3-3 stack that a lot of people think of where you have three inside linebackers. It’s an odd front, so you have split linebackers, but morphs into a stack by basically moving what is an outside linebacker back as a stack safety in the middle of the box. There’s a lot movement, a lot of blitzing, so I’m excited about that and I think the kids are excited and see it’s going to be a fun defense to play.”
Fanara will not be able to join the Brownwood staff full time until after STAAR testing as he currently teaches a Biology class, but he will be popping in on days when it works with his schedule.
“He was here Tuesday and we were able to sit the kids down and give them an overview of the defense, basic alignments and coverages, and what we’re looking for at each position and the kids who play those positions,” Brixey said. “On the days he’s able to be here, we’ll be working on installing our defense no matter what our schedule might say.”
Brixey added he will be looking to hire three more assistants in the near future.
Brixey also revealed Wednesday that the Lions’ first scrimmage for 2025 has been changed as Brownwood will now travel to Wichita Falls Legacy instead of Argyle Liberty Christian, and that will take place Thursday, Aug. 14.
“Coach Greg Davis is the head coach at Wichita Falls Legacy and we’ve worked together before so I think it’s going to be a really good scrimmage for us,” Brixey said. “They have four different teams, so we’ll be able to scrimmage our freshmen and a combined freshman/sophomore team at the same time back to back on the field, then we’ll go with the JV and varsity.”
The rest of the 2025 schedule will remain the same as 2024, with home and road dates flipped from last year. The lone exception is the neutral site pre-district finale Oct. 3 against Ingleside, which Brixey said could end up being played at Smithson Valley. Those arrangements could be finalized in the coming days.
“The game was in Boerne last year, and Boerne said they couldn’t host it again this year,” Brixey said. “We’ve talked to a couple of places and Tuesday I talked to Larry Hill at Smithson Valley and the whole Comal ISD is open that weekend. He’s willing to host us but he’s got to get permission from his athletic director. It’s 161 miles from Brownwood and 169 miles from Ingleside, so that’s about as close to the middle as you can get.”
Brixey added the Lions will also be changing uniforms from Adidas to Nike for the coming season, but the overhaul of the look isn’t expected to be drastic.
“I asked the kids what they wanted and it was near unanimous they wanted Nike uniforms, and it doesn’t matter to me even though I’ve almost always been a Nike guy,” Brixey said. “I’m not flashy. I’ve looked at what a traditional Brownwood uniform is and the only thing different will be they’re new and they’ll have that check mark on it, but you’ll see Brownwood Lions on the field.”
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Brownwood Lions 2025 Varsity Football Schedule
| Aug. 14 | at Wichita Falls Legacy | 7 p.m. | Scrimmage |
| Aug. 21 | Alvarado | 7 p.m. | Scrimmage |
| Aug. 29 | at Abilene Wylie | 7 p.m. | |
| Sept. 5 | Wall | 7:30 p.m. | |
| Sept. 12 | at Glen Rose | 7 p.m. | |
| Sept. 19 | at Waco La Vega | 7 p.m. | |
| Sept. 26 | China Spring | 7:30 p.m. | Homecoming |
| Oct. 3 | Ingleside (tentatively at Smithson Valley) | 7 p.m. | |
| Oct. 10 | Lampasas* | 7:30 p.m. | Pink Out |
| Oct. 17 | OPEN | ||
| Oct. 24 | at Burnet* | 7:30 p.m. | |
| Oct. 31 | Stephenville* | 7:30 p.m. | Senior Night |
| Nov. 7 | at Marble Falls* | 7:30 p.m. |
District 4-4A Division I Game