Robert Casey, WSU Athletics

OGDEN — Fans and the general public don’t often hear about two football staffers who do significant work for their team. At Weber State, the Wildcats are experiencing change at those two positions for the first time in a while.

WSU has brought on Micah Cloward as director of sports performance and Kyra Shea as director of football operations.

Cloward replaces Derek Rosinski and Shea replaces Derrick Luken, both of whom worked in their positions for eight years. Rosinski posted that he was saying “farewell” to coaching in February and Luken was recently hired for the same role at North Dakota State.

As sports performance director, Cloward generally oversees strength, conditioning and nutrition across all athletics programs, collaborating with performance coaches assigned to other sports while primarily working as the strength and conditioning coach for the football team.

Cloward is a native of Casper, Wyoming, and played football at Idaho State from 2006-08. He’s worked at Illinois, Wisconsin, Utah State, Idaho State, Oregon State and was most recently director of strength and conditioning at the University of Sioux Falls. He spent time as interim director of football strength and conditioning at Oregon State.

Robert Casey, WSU Athletics

Cloward said WSU’s recent success, its facilities and his ties to various coaches drew him to WSU.

“There’s been a really good decade of success and, even back when I was playing, going against Weber State was tough, physical,” Cloward said. “It’s always been about development here and … having those ties helped in getting a feel for the place and understanding the values.”

At Division II Sioux Falls, Cloward was the man for almost all sports. Weber State offered the opportunity to sink his teeth primarily into football while working alongside other performance coaches, which was a career goal.

He arrived during spring camp and has taken charge.

“Coach Cloward is great. I talk to him almost daily about how can I get stronger, how can I eat better, sleep better, how can I hydrate better,” junior linebacker Alema Tupuola said. “He’s helped me physically prepare for this year but also challenged me to push myself to be a leader for the team, for the defense, in the weight room.”

Tupuola says Cloward pushes everyone to work hard and work together, “treats everyone with respect” and “will call out anyone” who can give better effort — veterans and freshmen alike.

Cloward says his focus is on getting each player to his top speed, including how to accelerate and decelerate quickly, play with strength and be able to do repeated motions with maximum effort.

“We’re trying to hit on every attribute they need to perform because they’re not here to be a weightlifter, they’re not here to be a track star — so our plan is to train all the attributes we need and develop players in the most holistic way possible,” Cloward said about coaching his football players.

Head coach Mickey Mental said he loved the job Rosinksi did but that a new voice can also be beneficial. He’s liked how Cloward’s program fits his vision for athleticism and explosion when it comes to how his team plays.

“Everything’s about speed,” Mental said. “We can see workloads and effort and volume, see the numbers and get into it from an analytics standpoint, which is really good for us.”

Aside from the training side, the director of sports performance plays a big role for the football team.

For large stretches of the offseason, the strength coach is the stand-in head coach. In several moratoriums throughout the year, rules prohibit coaches from contact with players that is directly related to coaching or football. In some periods, players can be required to attend weight or conditioning workouts but only the strength coach can be present, coaching-wise.

“He interacts with them year-round … so having a guy like Micah who can connect at a high level and push these guys past their breaking point, in a good way, that’s definitely vital if you want to be successful.”

As director of football operations, Shea comes to Weber State after several stops around the region. A graduate of Colorado State, she interned with the CSU Rams and at Northern Colorado before being hired at the Air Force Academy as the administrative operations staffer for three seasons.

She was the assistant director of football operations and executive assistant to the head coach at UNLV for the 2022 season before losing her job with a coaching change. She spent one year in Boston for a company that coordinates student travel and study abroad opportunities — and realized she wanted to be back in the game.

“Being a military kid and working at Air Force, those boys hold a special place in my heart and really helped me love football,” Shea said. “Watching these guys grow and know that I’m having an impact on their lives, it’s great.”

The football operations director is tasked to handle all the details of staging a football season and anything adjacent to the team: booking hotel rooms, flights, charter buses, meals and catering for the road, and anything else required for travel, games and other obligations.

At a program the size of Weber State, the director of football operations also helps with social media presence and strategy.

After a monthlong process and a cross-country drive, Shea arrived Monday and jumped into the fire.

“You don’t normally have to hire a DFO a week before the first game but the former DFO did a great job so I’m just working out the details and getting set,” Shea said. “Outside of the trainers, I’m the only girl in the office … but it’s a drama-free zone and I love direct, up-front communication.

“I want to take care of everything off the field so the players and coaches can do everything on the field,” she said.