The Coaching carousel in Arkansas High School football has seen some large moves this offseason. Fayetteville’s Casey Dick left for Texas High School football; in turn, former Razorback and Pulaski Academy Head Coach Anthony Lucas took over the 7A West program. With the opening at the Little Rock private school, Sylvan Hills head coach Mark Kelley was named Head Coach of the Bruins. Coach Kelley had engineered a turnaround at Sylvan Hills that had them in the Semi-Finals in just one season. Legendary Arkansas Head Coach Clay Totty was released by Wynne, then hired by Hazen. When it looked like Greenwood was going to go another season with minor changes, then Wednesday morning happened.
Chris Young to step into Administrative role
In February, Junior High Defensive Coordinator Brandon Godfrey was announced as the Safeties coach in place of Percy Arnold. Former Bulldog Parker Gill was hired in March to fill the spot opened on the Junior High staff.
Wednesday morning, Head Coach Chris Young met with the team to announce that he was stepping into an administrative role as Director of District Operations and Activities. It will be a dual role for the longtime Greenwood coach, combining his Athletic Director role with the duties and tasks of Kevin Hesslen. Hesslen was hired as the Superintendent of Alma Public Schools in March.
Chris Young started his coaching career at Greenwood as part of the Junior High coaching staff in 2000. Coach Young was the only coach on the staff who had been part of all 12 State Championships and 18 of the 19 State Title appearances. In his tenure as a Head Coach, the Bulldogs went to six consecutive state title games and posted a 71-8 record, including three State Championships. During that 26-year run as a coach, he mentored Bulldog household names like Drew Morgan and Kane Archer.
“Congrats, man. You played one of the most important roles in my career. Foundational. Forever thankful. Sincerely. Best wishes in the new adventure. Great opportunity ahead.” Former Bulldog and Arkansas Razorback Drew Morgan sent in a text message to Coach Young.
“Coach Young was the most detailed and THE MOST honest coach I ever had.” Former Bulldog and current Utah Ute Kane Archer said. Archer set national and state records in his four years under Chris Young. “He made everyone buy in and personally made me want to run through a brick wall at times, and I can never say that I’ve said that about anyone else,” Archer said with a laugh. “Coach Young has made one of the biggest impacts in my life, in my time playing for him. I will always be grateful.”
In the shadow of cleared shelves and State Championship rings, Coach Young reflected on his time as Head Coach. “It’s been a dream job. When Rick [Jones] left six years ago, I think there was a lot of fear about me taking over. I think we’ve taken it to another level, even our culture. The way the kids act, the way they treat each other in the locker room, the way they work. I think it’s better than it’s ever been; our numbers are better. We have 107 out for varsity right now. We have 200 in Junior High; we’ve never had numbers. You always want to leave a program in a good or better shape than when you took it. And I think we’ve done that.”
“When I combined Jobs and took the Athletic Director three years ago, I knew that you couldn’t do both forever. Obviously, at that point, there was kind of a plan. The school board has to make those decisions, but I kind of saw there was going to be an opportunity to move up into upper administration. I sure didn’t think that Mr. Hesslen was going to get hired as Superintendent at Alma right now and speed up the process, but that is essentially what happened.” Coach Young said.
“It’s going to be awesome. I’m going to have the ability to spend time with my wife and kids that I haven’t had in 27 years of working on the weekends. My wife (Kelly Young) has been a huge, huge part of my success personally, but just always being there for me. Now it’s a time, maybe I can do something with her and the kids and my parents that I haven’t been doing in the past.” Coach Young said about life after leading a team like Greenwood.
