Dan Enos in stride after recruiting stage, before spring ball

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Jan. 12 was an exciting day for Dan Enos.

His first day as Central Michigan University’s head football coach was spent meeting his team for the first time, answering questions from the media and taking in his surroundings.

But on the car ride home with his family to their Lansing home, it hit him.

“I almost had an anxiety attack,” Enos said. “I was thinking about everything that I had to do.”

He kept busy the next three weeks, managing CMU’s recruiting class and filling the spots of those who defected to other programs after former coach Butch Jones left for Cincinnati.

But Enos is finding his stride a little more than a month later.

He has conducted his first on-field workouts with the team, implementing a regimen called the “Fourth Quarter Program,” which consists of four conditioning drills that give the coaching staff a better indication of what they inherited.

The program was adapted from a system used by Buck Nystrom, who coached under George Perles at Michigan State when Enos quarterbacked the Spartans in the late 1980s. Nystrom’s son, Kyle, is now an assistant coach in charge of special teams and linebackers under Enos.

Coaches have been assigned recruiting roles and players have broken into units on offense, defense and special teams.

So Enos must have all of the more than 80 returning players’ names down, right?

“No. I’m working on it,” he said, laughing. “I’ve got tape and I hand-write ‘Coach Enos’ on it and put it on my shirt. Every trainer, every coach, every player has got it on there.”

Enos focuses on leveling with his players — ensuring their input is welcomed and considered.

“Even offensively and defensively, we’ve asked them, ‘What did you do here (before)?’” he said. “We want to empower them, too. We don’t sit here and claim we have all the answers.”

Linebacker Nick Bellore, who returns for his senior season, said Enos has reached out to the players, including meeting with each player on the roster during his first week.

“He’s just a really young, energetic guy,” Bellore said. “He’s been a little more laid back, but we really haven’t been through the fire yet in terms of spring ball and that kind of stuff.”

Getting settled

Enos is not exactly rooted in yet, however.

He and his wife, Jane, will close on a house in mid-March and look to move to Mount Pleasant in early April.

But he won’t carry on the tradition of living in the former coach’s abode, such as Jones did when he moved into Brian Kelly’s house after Kelly left for Cincinnati in 2006.

“I think I disappointed everybody,” Enos said, laughing.

His daughter, Idalia, in third grade, will switch schools at that point and finish the school year in Mount Pleasant. His son, Alex, has yet to begin school.

For now, Enos resides in an off-campus apartment complex after calling the Comfort Inn home for three weeks.

His family stays in Lansing, but he still receives plenty of visits from Jane, who dropped by his office last week with lunch in hand. He also often commutes to Lansing on weekends.

Setting a tone

Enos said he feels welcomed by the community and compelled to continue the program’s success.

“Everywhere I go, it’s been real positive, real supportive, but I get a feeling like, ‘Hey, we feel very passionate about this coach, so you better keep it going,’” he said. “Which is good — it’s better than nobody even knowing who you are.”

As a first-time head coach, Enos said he enjoys being able to set the tone of a program simply through his attitude. This includes discipline, something he stresses more than nearly anything else.

“We’ve made it quite clear around here that you’re going to live right off the field. You’re going to be a good person and, academically, you’re going to do everything you’re supposed to do,” he said. “Otherwise, you’re going to have problems.”

Despite the flurry of activity in his first four weeks, his second month is not likely to bring much relief — he has spring practice to prepare for, which begins March 18.

“I think I step into it not knowing everything that’s going to be behind the door,” Enos said. “But I do feel like I’m very prepared and at least organized to get us from one phase to the next phase.”