Brent Indest and Craig Brodie have spent a lifetime on the sideline.

The two men have coached high school football for a combined 58 years and counting, including, ironically, both as head coach at Catholic High School at different times. They have spent thousands of hours breaking down game tape on Saturday mornings, conducting two-a-day practices in the sweltering Louisiana humidity in August and making sure their players have enough snacks to eat after a road game on Friday nights. 

There is no doubt Indest and Brodie eat, sleep and breathe high school football. That doesn’t mean that you will ever hear them talk about the sport when they are away from the field house. 

“We break bread very often,” said Indest, who is in his fifth season as head coach at Catholic High. “It would probably be a real shock to most people how little we talk football away from the school. We both leave our work at work. We don’t take it home with us.”

“Most Saturday nights we get together and have a barbecue with the family and that is the last thing we talk about,” said Brodie, who is married to Indest’s sister Maria. “We spend so much time talking about it here in the field house that when we are at home we want to talk about something else.”

Even though they might not bring football talk home with them they might make an exception to that rule if their team comes back home from New Orleans with the state championship trophy. Catholic High (11-1) takes on Notre Dame (12-0) in the Division III championship game today at 7 p.m. in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome.

“I’ve watched from the stands in both 2011 and 2013 when he reached the ’Dome,” Brodie said of his brother-in-law’s previous two trips to the Superdome. “To be part of this with him is a very special thing.”

Careers criss-cross

The 51-year-old Indest was a star quarterback at Catholic High, one of four brothers to do so, but his playing career ended soon after he graduated in 1984. Indest walked on at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette (then known as USL) but didn’t make the team and realized pretty quickly that his future would be spent on the football field but not as a player.

“There wasn’t a big market for short and slow quarterbacks,” Indest said with a laugh.

It was during a trip back home though that Indest unexpectedly helped kick start his brother-in-law’s coaching career.

“When I had graduated here in 1984, I had came back to visit Coach Darcy Delcambre that summer and he had mentioned that they were looking for coaches. So I told him that he needed to hire my brother-in-law Craig. I would be damned if they didn’t hire him,” Indest said.

After graduating from college, Indest got his first assistant coach job at his alma mater before serving as an assistant coach for five years at Abbeville, before becoming the head coach there from 1996-2002. Indest then coached at Crowley High for four years before making the jump to college as an assistant under Derek Dooley at Louisiana Tech. Indest spent only one year in the college ranks. 

“It was six weeks into my college job that I realized that this wasn’t for me,” Indest said. “I was taking my daughter, who was in fourth grade at the time, to school one morning. That was really the only time I could spend time with the kids taking them school. I remember asking my daughter, ‘Jessica, how would you feel about moving back to New Iberia and being with all your cousins and your family?’ She said that sounded great.”

Indest moved the family back to his hometown of New Iberia but there wasn’t a job open locally, so he commuted for two years from New Iberia to Kaplan, and then to Carencro for three more years while serving as head coach at both schools, including leading Carenrcro to the Class 5A state championship game in 2011. 

“The thought process was to always get back a little closer to home,” Indest said.

The 56-year-old Brodie had beat Indest back home already.

After serving as an assistant at Catholic High from 1984-86, Brodie took a job as a defensive coordinator at Carencro where he would coach for nearly a decade, including winning a state championship in 1992. Brodie then came back home to serve as defensive coordinator at New Iberia Senior High from 1996-97 before becoming the first head coach-athletic director at the then-newly created Westgate High.

“That first year I had nothing but freshman and sophomores out there playing for me,” Brodie said. “It was tough, for sure, and then every time we got competitive on the field we would get bumped a classification and then again. But eventually we got things going in the right direction there.”

Brodie led Westgate to the state playoffs four times, including a pair of trips to the Class 5A quarterfinals. After nine years, Brodie left the program he helped create to take over the place where he first got his coaching start — Catholic High.

Brodie coached the Panthers for three seasons, including leading the team to its first state semifinal appearance since 1962. Brodie, though, was let go unexpectedly after 2009 and never imagined coming back to the school on Admiral Doyle Drive.

After a year spent at Franklin Senior High, Brodie took over as head coach and athletic director at Berwick High. After the 2015 season, Brodie had reached his 25th year in the state public school system and was 55 years old, which qualified him for the DROP program. He began eyeing retirement.

His brother-in-law had other plans.

 The unexpected reunion

In 2013, Indest finally had the opportunity to return to his alma mater as head coach. 

Indest found success early as he guided the team back to the state semifinals in 2013 and then a state runner-up finish in 2014. Heading into the 2016 season Indest knew he was going to need a defensive coordinator for 2017. His then-current defensive coordinator, Josh Dworaczyk, was leaving for a job in the private sector after the season, so Indest wanted someone to serve as the DC in waiting in 2016. 

The first person he called was Brodie. 

“The bottom line is that I have been behind the eight ball since I have gotten here,” Indest said. “We are understaffed in football. We are trying to compete with the Notre Dames of the world with very few coaches on campus. So I was sitting there knowing that we might have a physical education position opening up and the first person that jumped to my mind was Craig. The timing was great for it to happen.”

“He called me that December and at that point I was trying to decide if I was going to enter the DROP program and complete my three years or do I take the job here at Catholic High,” Brodie said. “I was shocked and surprised that he called me. I didn’t know what to think. At that point, I didn’t know what I wanted to do.”

After mulling it over for nearly a month, Brodie decided to take the job.

“It worked out well,” said Brodie, whose son, Craig Jr., worked as an assistant under Indest at CHS. “I was at a point in my life where the grind of being head coach, athletic director and teacher at a school 50 miles away from where I lived had just become such a grind. Don’t get me wrong, I loved being at Berwick but it was time for a change. If this had been 10 years ago it would have never happened because I wasn’t going to take a back seat to anyone. I am in a different place in my life now. I got a 2-year-old grandson now and my daughter is married. I don’t let things bother me as much as they used to.”

Brodie joining the staff has been an easy transition.

“It has just been smooth,” said Indest, who has a 176-80 career coaching record. “Craig knows the type of guy that I am. I am not saying that I am the easiest guy to deal with at times because I am not. I get a little fired up at practice and I get a little fired up on the sideline. He is a thick-skinned guy and knows how to deal with me.”

Indest also appreciates when his brother-in-law, who he refers to as a “student of the game,” gets fired up himself.

“He is very laid back compared to how I am out there on the field,” Indest said. “But there are times where he gets fired up at practice and I will get a little excited. You appreciate it because you know how much it means to him. Craig is not necessarily a mild-mannered guy by any stretch but he is a lot more mild-mannered than I am.”

For Brodie, his time spent at Catholic High has rejuvenated his passion for the game.

“You know I was a head coach for 20 years but I am kind of loving not being a head coach,” Brodie said with a laugh. “I get a kick out of Brent. He will get upset because he has to go administer the basketball game or some other function or do an interview. You know what I am doing? I am at home watching TV.

“The first few months, I remember being bored because I wasn’t having to answer my phone all the time. Now that I am an assistant again, I see all the things that he deals with that I used to have to deal with,” he said. “I think what he is doing is incredible.” 

Respect and sibling rivalry

Despite a vast amount of knowledge and success as a head coach, Brodie has no interest in showing up his brother-in-law. Even though he spent the majority of his career coaching a four-man front defense, Brodie agreed to switch to using Indest’s three-man front, which was a challenge for Brodie but a decision he felt was the right one.

“I know how I would want my assistants to talk to me or to treat me and that is what I try to do with him,” Brodie said. “Look, as a head coach if you just allow the coordinators to do what they want to do then you have to learn from that person. And then what happens if that coach leaves? What Brent has done well is that he has a system that coaches have to learn. It’s like coming in and learning on the fly. Don’t get me wrong, it was tough at first, quite a lot of work, but it has gotten easier and easier every week.”

Brodie may go along with what his brother-in-law’s game plan but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a rivalry between the two, especially when Indest throws a little shade Brodie’s way. Indest still jokingly brings up the fact his Kaplan team rushed 499 yards in a game against Brodie’s Catholic High team back in 2008 (the only meeting between the two coaches). 

Brodie answered by making sure this week to wear his state title ring. “I am wearing it all this week,” he said with a chuckle. Plus, Brodie said if he ever gets to the point where a disagreement with Indest causes a problem he has an ace up his sleeve.

“It is hard for me to talk to my wife about if I have an issue with Brent because that is her brother,” Brodie said. “That puts my wife into a tough position. So if I really had a problem with him I would just go talk to his mama and tell on him. He is a big mama’s boy. So whatever his mama says goes. I have never done that though … not yet.”

For Indest, being able to share this special season with his brother-in-law has been a highlight of his accomplished career.

“I think what makes it all the more special is how our extended family has rallied around it,” Indest said. “With Craig being here, it really has become a family affair. Everybody in our family and community has gotten behind us.”

For Indest, his favorite moment this season was after the team shut out Isidore Newman two weeks ago in a semifinals showdown in New Orleans. 

“We were up 35-0 at the half but I am one of those guys that doesn’t get comfortable until there is four or three minutes left in the game,” Indest said. “Once it was done I turned and gave Craig a big hug on the sideline. It wasn’t the first time I had ever hugged a coach on the sideline but it was the first time that it was a member of my family and that was special.”