Palmyra promotes Tyler Krietemeyer to football head coach

Krietemeyer will take over for Kevin Miles, who resigned last fall after 12 seasons at the helm.

"I ended up finally taking over the job after I had some discussion with Coach Miles and some people around the school," Krietemeyer said. "I decided it was going to be what was best for my family and the program moving forward. I've had a lot of positive comments directed towards me. This community is a great place for sports in general."

Krietemeyer will assume the duties of being offensive coordinator next season, as well as head coach, with someone else taking over as defensive coordinator.

"I definitely think my experience calling plays (will help)," Krietemeyer said. "Number one, speed-wise getting used to that. Number two, just understanding the flow of the game and how defenses work is definitely going to benefit me moving forward."

Palmyra has already added an assistant coach to join Krietemeyer next season, with Mark Twain offensive line coach Dalton Hill joining the 2023 staff.

Hill will serve as assistant football , as well as the Palmyra strength and conditioning coach.

"We'll keep some coaches and then we got a couple of new hires coming in as well," Krietemeyer said. "They'll be a little bit of change and there will be a little bit of it staying the same. It will be kind of a balance there."

During Krietemeyer's first season as defensive coordinator, Palmyra went 12-1 and made the Class 2 state semifinals.

The 2022 season was a challenging one for Palmyra, who finished 0-10 and had to forfeit its only win due to a MSHSAA rules violation.

Krietemeyer said he's not going to focus on the past, but work on moving Palmyra down its own path in the future.

"There's not really a whole lot of difference between a 10-0 team and an 0-10 team, honestly," Krietemeyer said. "It's a few tweaks here and there and a few breaks here and there. As far as the talent level of kids, I feel like we are still up there and we can compete with anybody."

Krietemeyer said he hopes that Palmyra football will be something the community can rally behind and be proud of.

"I think the big thing we are going to push this year is some positivity and being proud to be part of a pretty special program with Palmyra football," Krietemeyer said. "Getting back to that team. That if nothing else is something every week someone circles us and says Palmyra is going to come to play and we've got to be on our A game because they are always going to be."

One thing Krietemeyer has figured out is the quarterback position, with Marty Smyser III taking over as starter during his sophomore season in 2022 and having two more seasons left.

"He's such a great kid," Krietemeyer said. "He's mature beyond his years and got the jitters out last year. Actually, I called the offense the first game of the season last year and it was his first varsity game as well. So we both kind of got thrown into the fire pretty early on as younger people in those roles. So we grew a little bit last year together."