The Culture Shift That Started with a Single Sentence
When Andrew DiDonato walked into that auditorium on August 13, 2016, he wasn’t holding a PowerPoint, a whiteboard, or a list of rules. He had one sentence—and he repeated it for five straight minutes.
“To glorify God in the pursuit of earning a degree, building lasting relationships, and competing for PAC championships.”
That was it. The players sat there, quiet. Maybe confused. Maybe a little hopeful. Grove City hadn’t won a game in three years. DiDonato knew what they were all thinking. Here comes another guy with a plan. But this wasn’t just a slogan to print on a banner.
That line? It was the foundation.
Brick by Brick Football Program Turnaround
Grove City was 0–20 when DiDonato took over. By 2023, they were 10–0 with their first-ever PAC title and NCAA playoff win. But the climb wasn’t romantic. It wasn’t linear. As DiDonato would say over and over again, it was brick by brick.
“I told the seniors right away,” he said. “You’re probably not going to win a PAC championship. But your brick matters. You’re sowing seed that others will reap.”
That might sound like a tough sell, but one player—Brett Pinson—understood it. By the end of his senior year, Pinson was 0–30 as a college football player. Yet on the final Monday of the season, DiDonato asked him, “Why are you going to practice today?” Pinson didn’t flinch.
“To compete for PAC championships.”
Video from Coach DiDonato’s course.
Vision, Process, Love: The Core of DiDonato’s Leadership
DiDonato’s Brick by Brick program turnaround blueprint wasn’t born the day he took over. It had been marinating since 2010 when he first heard Pat Williams speak: “View yourself as a leader. Prepare to be a leader. And when the opportunity comes, take it.” That line stayed with him like scripture. It became his compass.
And when he got the call, he didn’t walk in trying to impress. He walked in convicted. What followed was a masterclass in intentional culture-building.
Vision. Process. Love.
Three words. But they drove everything.
Vision meant knowing exactly who they were aiming to become. Not the best in the country—just better than the ten other teams in the President’s Athletic Conference.
Process meant doing one thing better each day. “See a little, see a lot,” he’d say. “See a lot, see nothing.”
And love—maybe the hardest—meant accepting that some players would pour themselves into something they’d never see come to full bloom.
When Everything Changed: Grove City’s Breakthrough in 2018
There was a stretch early on when DiDonato let his team run every scheme imaginable. Power, zone, gap—everything. He wasn’t being indecisive. He was gathering data.
“If I would’ve said, ‘This is what we’re best at,’ I’d be lying. We were last in the league in scoring. I had no proof. So we ran everything until we found it.”
That search paid off. In 2018, they found their offensive identity and reeled off seven straight wins—their first winning season and their first postseason win in 125 years. The vision was no longer a hope—it was a history.
Navigating Doubt: Staying the Course Through Setbacks
But it wasn’t all upward momentum. In 2022, they went 8–3 and won another bowl game—but DiDonato calls it one of the lowest moments in the journey. “I had two people come into my office in the same day,” he recalled. “One said we need to double down on something, the other said get rid of it altogether.”
It would’ve been easy to pivot, to chase approval. But he didn’t flinch.
“Answer to the vision—not man’s opinion.”
That season of friction gave them the clarity they needed. The next year, Grove City went undefeated.
DiDonato doesn’t see vision as a poster or a locker room catchphrase. He sees it as a living, breathing filter for every choice. It’s not just what you do—it’s who you are.
And even now, he’s still looking ahead after achieving the unthinkable. “Our vision now isn’t just PAC championships,” he said. “It’s national championships. Because that’s who we are now. That’s who we aim to be.”
A Blueprint for Coaches: Lessons from Grove City’s Turnaround
For coaches taking over a program, the temptation is always to fix the scoreboard, win fast, and overhaul systems. DiDonato’s Brick by Brick program turnaround story offers a different approach.
It’s slower. Harder. More honest.
But if you build it brick by brick, and you stick to your vision even when the world says to pivot—you just might find yourself walking into a playoff game holding something no one can take away:
A team that knows exactly who it is.
Learn more from Coach DiDonato
Coach DiDonato has a course on CoachTube where he presents his plan based on “Vision.”
On CoachTube: The Power of Vision: From 0-10 to 10-0
CoachTube is your resource for all the football knowledge you need with over 4,000 courses on every topic in the game.
Want more Turnaround stories? Here’s one on Steve Pyne’s Formula for a Turnaround.
