Regional High School Coaches of the Year

PERFECTION
5 REGIONAL WINNERS FROM 5 UNDEFEATED TEAMS-ALL SHOWING A DOMINANCE IN THEIR REGION
by: Jeff Davis
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MIDWEST REGION
Kerry Coombs, Colerain HS, Cincinnati

“I think being a high school coach is one of the best things anybody can do.” That holds especially true for Cincinnati Colerain Coach Kerry Coombs, whose Cardinals blazed away to win one of high school football’s most prestigious titles, the Division I state championship of Ohio.

Most important, Coombs’s Cardinals saved their best effort for the title game on December 4 as they manhandled traditional Northeastern Ohio power Canton McKinley 50-10 on McKinley’s home field, Fawcett Stadium, across the way from the Pro Football Hall of Fame. It was a title game scoring record as the Cardinals’ triple option offense rolled up 489 yards. After McKinley took a 10-6 lead to open the second quarter, Colerain buckled down to score the game’s next 44 points thanks to quarterback Dominick Goodman’s state playoff record 259 yards on 21 carries as he tied the state record with four touchdowns. Coombs’ Cardinals averaged 46 points per game and had the largest margin of victory of any Ohio high school team in history-39.8.

Ohio has produced several of high school football’s most legendary coaches, chief among them two men from Massillon, Paul Brown and Chuck Mather, and Cincinnati Moeller’s Gerry Faust. As great as their teams were, perhaps none in the history of the Buckeye State can approach Kerry Coombs’ Colerain unit that blazed its way to a 15-0 record to capture the school’s first Division I title.

Unlike those men who moved on to collegiate success, and in Brown’s case, mastery of the professional game with his Cleveland Browns, Coombs likes it exactly where he is, at his alma mater in the city of his birth. “I really like my job and I really love Colerain,” Coombs says. “I have no plans to leave.”

WEST REGION
Butch Goncharoff - Bellevue HS, Bellevue (WA)

America outside the Pacific Northwest discovered a smart, wonderful high school football program on opening night of the 2004 season when Bellevue, Washington’s Wolverines, stunned De La Salle of Concord California 39-20 to end the nation’s longest ever high school winning streak at 151 games.

Anyone who thought the outcome was an upset was mistaken as Bellevue proved over and again that this was no fluke. No team that has won four consecutive championships in tough competition like that served up in Washington is a fluke.

In just his fifth year at Bellevue, Butch Goncharoff is the first head coach in Washington state history to win four titles in a row. The Wolverines were a perfect 13-0 this past fall. Goncharoff has found success by creating a dominant feeder system, the nine team junior Wolverine program. As coach of the juniors, Goncharoff’s “kids” went 104-4-1, winning seven league titles. Since he took over the varsity at the high school, Goncharoff’s Wolverines have won 57 of the 60 games he’s coached, good for four straight state 3A titles.

How long will this success story continue? According to Goncharoff, it could last far into the future. “Kids come in and see the success the program has had. We didn’t have to teach them the excitement, it was already there.” As long as Butch Goncharoff is there, Bellevue stands to keep winning – big.

EAST REGION
Art Walker Jr. - Central Catholic HS, Pittsburgh

The runaway winner of the East Region of the National Prep poll is Central Catholic High in Pittsburgh whose head man Art Walker Jr. is a popular choice as the region’s Coach of the Year. Walker’s Central Catholic Vikings rolled through the regular season and the tough PIAA-AAAA playoffs in high style. They completed an unprecedented 16-0 season with a 49-14 rout of Neshaminy in the championship game at Hershey on December 11.

This title, the second in school history (they won in 1995) made Central Catholic one of the truly dominant champions in a state where football has been king since the beginning of the sport, especially in the cradle of great professional players, Western Pennsylvania. It was the button that capped a superb five-year run for Walker-coached teams at the school that produced legendary Pitt All-American and first ballot Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Dan Marino.

It was no easy run for Walker, the son and namesake of legendary Pennsylvania high school coach Art Walker, Sr.

Art Jr. was 28 when he took over the program in 1998. The grumbling began right away when he went 4-6 and 3-7 in his first two seasons. Then, everything turned around in 2000. The Vikings reached the Western PIAL quarterfinals going 8-3. The next season, Central Catholic advanced to the WPIAL title game in an 11-2 season. Walker survived a coach’s nightmare in 2002 when the Pittsburgh’s Diocese pulled the team out of the playoffs after two players were charged with criminal conduct prior to the season. He withstood calls for his resignation and rebounded in 2003 winning the WPIAL title. That led to the 2004 sweep of both the WPIAL and PIAA-AAAA class.

The 2004 edition averaged 38 points a game and gave up just 5 for its 16 opponents, leaving Walker’s record the last five seasons at 61-23. But the 2004 season will long be remembered not only in the Pittsburgh area but throughout the Keystone State.

SOUTHEAST REGION
Rush Propst -Hoover HS (Alabama)

It’s no accident that Hoover High School in Birmingham has gained a stranglehold on Alabama’s 6A football championship. It never is when a Rush Propst-coached team takes the field. When Hoover defeated Prattville 22-7 on December 16, at Legion Field in Birmingham, to complete a perfect 15-0 season, Propst’s players had earned their fourth state title in the last five years. It’s habit, Coach Propst has made commonplace, going 77-7 since he arrived at the school in 1999.

Hoover’s record was mediocre at best before then. His first team went 7-3 for the schools’ first winning season since 1995. The first title came the following year and the floodgates opened. The only miss came in 2001 when Hoover fell short in the title game. Titles followed in 2002, 2003, and the past season, a season that saw the team finish with a number six national ranking.

Whenever Hoover’s Buccaneers suffer a rare defeat, Propst makes the most of it. “The one game we lost each year (‘01,’02,’03) rekindled our energy.” As noted, there was no energy to rekindle in 2004, the flame was lit and burned brightly throughout a season that saw Hoover quarterback Jarod Bryant walk away with Mr. Football honors.

What’s the winning secret for Russell Propst? “We have good players, tremendous assistant coaches, and the kids have a great work ethic. The kids are focused on football twelve months a year.”
What will 2005 bring to Hoover? If past is prologue, look out. Again.

SOUTH REGION
Ricky Woods - South Panola HS, Batesville, MS

South Panola High School has been the dominant prep power in Mississippi since the Tigers won their first Class 5A championship in 1993. Located in Batesville, a community of just over 7,000, 20 miles west of Oxford in the northern sector of the state, South Panola is as rich in talent as any spot in the country.

Veteran South Panola alumni in the NFL are Deshea Townsend with the Pittsburgh Steelers, well-traveled Dwayne Rudd, now with the Oakland Raiders, who both starred at Alabama, and fullback Charles Stackhouse, who played at Ole Miss before moving on to the New York Giants.

The current star and hot prospect for Coach Ricky Woods, is option quarterback Derek Pogues. In South Panola’s championship game against Ocean Springs at Jackson’s Memorial Stadium, Pogues ran wild, gaining 268 yards as he scored five touchdowns to lead the Tigers to a 39-21 victory for Woods’ second state title in as many years as head coach at the Batesville school. Pogues was named Mississippi’s High School Player of the Year.

No stranger to championship production, Woods won two 2A state titles at Ackerman and got his team to two more title games. Then, upon his arrival in 2003, Woods made a couple of changes, installed a more balanced attack, beat Oak Grove in the title game and returned to go all the way, 15-0 in 2004. “I inherited a great program and was fortunate not to mess it up,” the modest Woods says.

To say the least, Woods has carried on in style. South Panola’s winning streak in its last two championship seasons, both unbeaten, is 30 games. And no letup is in sight.

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