For the second year in a row, Frankfort will be led into the season by a new head coach.
Andrew Dudley, longtime Hot Dog baseball coach, was hired as the new head football coach following the 2025 season.
Dudley has led a successful baseball program, winning four Sectional titles and a Regional title in 2023.
The challenge set before Dudley is difficult, as he’s tasked with rebuilding a football program that has struggled to find success over the last several years. Dudley brings a talented staff with an array of different backgrounds to help him lead the charge.
“This wasn’t ‘we hired Andy Dudley and Andy Dudley found assistant coaches’; we really hired as a staff,” Dudley said. “I think if you didn’t know the background and know the situation, there were a lot of people that were caught off guard when they saw my name on the board minutes. But I’ve got a really unbelievable coaching staff.”
The staff includes Frankfort softball coach Cormac Jewell, Richard Sallee, Tom Potts, Mike Jewell, Scott Freeman, and Isac Chavez.
Frankfort’s last Sectional Championship was in 2006. Its last tournament game win was in 2013.
The Hot Dogs are just 4-45 over the last five seasons, and Dudley said he understands that getting back to winning takes consistency.
“For me, it’s a set of consistent standards,” Dudley said. “It’s getting the right people involved. I feel like my number one job is getting everything aligned with our ideals and standards. So that means flag football for first and second graders; that means the tackle teams with third, fourth, fifth and sixth, all of these things need connected. We’re trying to put systems in place.”
Dudley has made it a priority to connect with each student individually, and has preached the importance of communication between the coaching staff and players.
“Really, it’s about connection, it’s about communication, we do a lot of one-on-ones with the kids,” Dudley said. “When I accepted the position, the first thing I did, I didn’t hold a big meeting, I didn’t get everybody together, I just started meeting with every kid one-on-one. We sat down in a room together. I told them what my vision was, what my belief system was as far as how a program should be run, how players should act, and I told them, ‘this is going to be hard’.”
Looking at the roster for 2026, the Hot Dogs will have several returning players from last year’s team, but the key will be what happens in the trenches.
“We’ve got some athletes like Jaydon Davis, who’s winning the conference in the 100-meter and is a worker in the weight room, or Francisco Vega, who was an impactful player last year but has really gotten after it in the weight room and gotten bigger and stronger,” Dudley said. “I think we’re going to build our success on what happens up front; we’ve got some linemen that worked their tails off.”
The Hot Dogs enter year two in the new Monon Athletic Conference, which has already seen its fair share of success as conference champion Cascade won the 3A State Championship in 2025.
As usual, the schedule begins with out-of-conference rivalry games against Clinton Central and Clinton Prairie.
“Our number one priority is ‘we have to worry about what Frankfort football’s doing’,” Dudley said. “I’m a big believer in taking a look at everything and start with the things we have control over. Obviously we’re preparing for opponents and we’re looking at film… but by far the most important thing for me is what’s Frankfort doing, what identity are we going to set up and get our kids to buy into what we’re doing.”
Frankfort opens the season at home on Aug. 21 against Clinton Central. The game will be available to listen to on WILO.
To watch the full interview with coach Dudley, click below.