By Gene Schallenberg
Staff Reporter
NEW WAVERLY —
With the start of football practice a mere nine days away, now is when it gets interesting as New Waverly gets closer to finding its next head coach.
For a little more than a week, New Waverly ISD has been receiving plenty of job applications and resumes for the position of head football coach and athletic director. Once Friday’s deadline was reached, Superintendent Clay Webb had received more than 70 resumes.
After consulting with a few of his board members, who helped look over the resumes, Webb announced that nine of the candidates are finalists for the position of head football coach/athletic director and will be interviewed next week. Webb and the board of trustees plan on coming to a decision and hiring a coach next Thursday after all nine interviews have been conducted.
The nine finalists are Ricky Tullos, Tommy Bohannon, Eddie Baca, Mike Hancock, Jim Carson, Bill Goffney, Jerry Malone, M.K. Hamilton and Mark White.
Webb and the New Waverly Board of Trustees will interview five candidates Tuesday and four on Thursday.
“We’re hopeful that we’ll be able to hire a coach on Thursday after we conduct all of our interviews and discuss the finalists in executive session,” Webb said.
Tullos was the head football coach and athletic director the past three years at Cleveland High School, winning back-to-back district championships.
Bohannon has served at New Waverly the past three seasons as the offensive line coach for the football team and also the Bulldogs head baseball coach.
Baca, who coached at Pilot Point until 2001, coached at Eagle Pass Winn last season.
Hancock looks to return to New Waverly. The boys basketball coach at New Waverly until 2004, Hancock was also the defensive coordinator at NWHS under head coach Bob Eastland for nine seasons.
Carson was the head football coach and athletic director at Seguin High School for seven years until resigning in February. In his seven-year stint with the Matadors, Carson posted a 33-40 record. Carson led Seguin to the playoffs in 2005 and 2006, but finished with a 2-8 record the past three seasons.
The longest-tenured coach at New Waverly, Goffney brings more than 16 years of coaching experience to the table. Goffney has been the head boys basketball coach the past seven years, taking the Bulldogs to the state tournament the past three years. Goffney has also been an assistant coach on the football team for a number of years.
After more than 16 years as the head coach at Marlin, Malone joined a Kirbyville staff last year which played in the Class 2A Division I state championship game.
Along with two years of head coaching experience at Class 4A North Dallas High School, Hamilton was also an assistant at McMurry University.
White served as an assistant coach at Longview last season.
“Of the coaches that applied, these nine candidates are the top of their class,” Webb said. “They come from winning programs and would bring that success with them. There’s no front-runner right now and they’re all pretty level with one another. We’re looking forward to getting a chance to talk to them all next week.”
Of the candidates who applied but didn’t make the cut are New Waverly head track and field coach Garey Peveto and New Waverly native Paul Donelson.
Donelson was an assistant football coach for one year at New Waverly before being promoted to defensive coordinator, a position he held in the 2007 and in the 2008 district championship season. Donelson was the safeties coach at Spring Westfield this past school year where the Mustangs advanced to the area round of the Class 5A Division I playoffs.
“When looking at the experience all of our candidates had, we were looking for someone with more experience,” Webb said. “The committee looked at the qualifications we had in mind, including the length of time as a coordinator and how many head coaching assignments the candidates had.
“There were just more experienced coaches out there. Most of our finalists have 10 or more years of coaching experience.”
