new coach!!!

[Mr. Buddy Garrity]

We got Ronnie Thompson!!!!! yeah!!!

WE WANT STATE! WE WANT STATE! WE WANT STATE!

[Mr. Buddy Garrity]

Thompson wins job; next up: players
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By Dave Rogers - The News staff writer Posted: 02/16/06 - 11:52:28 pm CST

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Mike Tobias/The News Sports Former Thomas Jefferson head football coach Ronnie Thompson was named the Memorial Titan’s new head coach during Thursday evening’s PAISD board meeting.


Ronnie Thompson is getting a shot to prove he can go home again.

For the second time.

Thompson, 62, who played football for Thomas Jefferson a year ahead of Jimmy Johnson, returned to his alma mater for a four-year stint as coach and led TJ to the 1980 state championship game.

Now he'll be back again at Memorial Stadium, this time as head coach of Port Arthur's consolidated Memorial High, thanks to Thursday night's hiring by the Port Arthur school board.

"I don't know him well at all, but I'm going by the better judgment of the superintendent and the interviewing committee," board president Julia Samuels said after the meeting.


"We want a winning program and we want to bring pride back to the athletic program of Port Arthur. From the recommendation, it seems like this coach will be able to do it."

Reached by telephone at his Port Arthur home Tuesday evening, Thompson said, "I'll tell you what, it's fantastic. It's just a resurgence of energy, emotion and love for my hometown.

"I've got players down there (at Memorial) who played for folks I coached. It's just a heavenly connection in a combat zone."

Asked what he meant by the use of the term "combat zone," Thompson said he was talking about the rugged nature of football.

"Football, it's a very hostile sport," he said, "but you (meaning Thompson) have coached some fathers, you've got some other kids who have kids down in the (Memorial subvarsity) system, you understand the town."

However, the new coach clearly has some fence-mending to do and unlike most Southeast Texans, this has nothing to do with Hurricane Rita.

With the famously-feuding school board members showing uncommon harmony and offering no negative votes to the recommendations by interim superintendent Jim Weeks of Raymond Polk as new Memorial High principal and Thompson as its coach, the evening's big split was left to the district's patrons.

The hirings brought a round of applause from at least half those present in the half-filled board meeting room at the Stilwell Center.

"I think Ronnie Thompson is a good coach," said James Zeno, father of Titan wide receiver Brian Melonson. "We've got to give him a chance. He took Todd Dodge and them to state."

Memorial High quarterback Davon Lewis didn't share that opinion.

"I quit!" he shouted as he and teammate Michael Haines led a stream of about a dozen and a half grumbling adults out of the meeting.

It seemed most of them wanted Port Arthur's interim AD, ninth-grade coach Michael "Shane" Sinegal, to be Port Arthur's next coach.

Lewis, a senior-to-be whose preseason knee injury former coach Dean Colbert cited as a big factor in Memorial's disappointing 2-5 record of last fall, was expected to be the school's top signal-caller next fall.

"They should have picked coach Sinegal," Lewis said. "Coach Sinegal's been in Port Arthur for a long time. Thompson ain't even got a winning record. Thompson is what, 4-16, going to the playoffs four times in 15, 16 years?

"And coach Sedberry (Bryan High coach Marvin Sedberry, another finalist for the job), he coached for 18 years, something like that, and he went to the playoffs 12, 13 years. They should have picked somebody else."

Lewis continued his tirade in front of television lights and cameras.

"We ain't going to fourth period (football's off-season period). He's going to get tired of us not going to fourth period," the teenager vowed.

He also said "They better find a quarterback for the summer (7-on-7 competition), because I know I ain't playing quarterback."

But Lewis stopped short of saying he wouldn't play for Thompson.

"I'm still lifting weights," he said. "Because if he's still here by the time the season starts, I'm playing."

Haines had a different complaint.

"They should have kept Dean Colbert," he said. "Dean Colbert was the best thing that happened to Memorial."

Thompson (whose 16-year high school head coaching record is over .500 at 83-72-3) didn't seem perturbed when the players' comments were relayed to him.

"Young kids can be led down the wrong path easily," he said. "That's all there is to it."

Sinegal and Thompson are both members of Port Arthur's city council.

"These kids look up to Shane. They love him," Thompson said. "Young kids have emotions, they have feelings. Lord, if that's the last statement they're going to make, I'd be shocked. It's just another day in a young guy's life."

Thompson says he wants to meet with holdover members of Colbert's Memorial coaching staff before naming a coaching staff. He said he sees a place for Sinegal, though, if Sinegal agrees.

"I've talked to the superintendent about it," Thompson said. "I've got some ideas. He seemed to like them, but I haven't talked to Shane. I've got to get with Shane. It's going to be a two-way street."

The new coach said his plans are to meet with Memorial's players as soon as today.

"I want to try to get with them (Friday) if I can. We've done lost enough time already," he said.

Besides Sinegal, others interviewed for the job include Sedberry, who has a 134-89-2 record (and 15 playoff appearances) in 20 seasons; Diboll coach Finis Vanover (115-110, six playoff appearances in 21 seasons); and Pflugerville Connally defensive coordinator Doug Wood.

Thompson has put his teams into the state playoffs on four occasions, going 4-3-1 in postseason play. Two of those playoff teams came before 1982, when only district champions reached the postseason.

Vidor had lost 42 games in a row when Thompson led them to a 5-4-1 record his first year on that job, 1975. TJ had not won district since 1970 when Thompson took over in 1978 and coached back-to-back district champs a couple of years later.

TJ went 8-2 in 1977, but coach Bob Burris got homesick for Oklahoma and took senior-to-be quarterback Mike Phipps and Phipps' coaching dad with him.

Thompson tried two seniors at quarterback his first season before finally settling on a sophomore at the end of a rocky 1-9 campaign. That sophomore, Todd Dodge, quarterbacked a 6-4 TJ team in 1979, then led the No. 1-ranked Yellow Jackets to the Class 5A title game in 1980, a loss to Odessa Permian.

Dodge, who became the first Texas high school quarterback to pass for 3,000 yards under Thompson, has coached Southlake Carroll to three 5A state titles the past four years and was named national coach of the year for 2004.

In 1981, junior Craig Stump was quarterback on a second consecutive Thompson-coached 10-0 TJ district championship squad. That team tied its bidistrict game but failed to advance because of penetrations.

Stump is head coach at Beaumont West Brook, which defeated Memorial last fall for the final District 22-5A playoff berth, then advanced three rounds deep into the playoffs.

Thompson left high school coaching for work as a college assistant at the University of Texas and Texas A&M. He returned to high school and coached nine seasons at South Garland before retiring in 2001.

A well-informed source said Thompson's two-year contract includes a salary "commensurate" with that paid Colbert. That would probably mean something in excess of the $72,455 top salary range posted for the job.

Colbert was paid $75,000 a year when he landed the Memorial job in 2002 with only one year's experience as a head coach. He was making $76,875 and a car allowance of $2,160 a year when he left.

"I'm not in it for the money," Thompson said.

The vote to hire Thompson was 6-0 with school board member Lonnie Linden abstaining. Linden is a city employee and said it would be a conflict of interest to take part in a matter involving a city councilman.

[Mr. Buddy Garrity]

oh FYI, we will more than likely have SLC's style of offense next year.:) :eek:

[Pack Daddy]

We got Ronnie Thompson!!!!! yeah!!!

WE WANT STATE! WE WANT STATE! WE WANT STATE!

Yes, yes ...my suggestion on a previous thread a few months ago! (applause) Thank you! Thank you! Glad to see it! Congrat's PA on a great pick!

[Drake]

Wow... This story is eerily similar to the script of a recent high school football movie... You think in 10 or 15 years we'll all be saying, "Remember the Titans?"

[drgnbkr]

Wow... This story is eerily similar to the script of a recent high school football movie... You think in 10 or 15 years we'll all be saying, "Remember the Titans?"


Cue the "Rocky" theme music please.....

[Mr. Buddy Garrity]

We just need to find another QB cause as you probably read in the post above (article) the starting QB flipped out and said he quits so good ridence!

[cfbobcat]

Memorial High quarterback Davon Lewis didn't share that opinion.

"I quit!" he shouted as he and teammate Michael Haines led a stream of about a dozen and a half grumbling adults out of the meeting.

Lewis continued his tirade in front of television lights and cameras.

"We ain't going to fourth period (football's off-season period). He's going to get tired of us not going to fourth period," the teenager vowed.

He also said "They better find a quarterback for the summer (7-on-7 competition), because I know I ain't playing quarterback."

But Lewis stopped short of saying he wouldn't play for Thompson.

"I'm still lifting weights," he said. "Because if he's still here by the time the season starts, I'm playing."




Is this article for real?

Maybe it is just me, but don't these comments strike anyone else as being over the top? How can a kid say things like this? A 17 year old kid shouldn't be able to make demands or hold any cards whatsoever in this situation. Just be a man and play football, I say. Unbelievable.

[Mr. Buddy Garrity]

Is this article for real?

Maybe it is just me, but don't these comments strike anyone else as being over the top? How can a kid say things like this? A 17 year old kid shouldn't be able to make demands or hold any cards whatsoever in this situation. Just be a man and play football, I say. Unbelievable.Yes they are real. He even had an interview with 2 news station basically ripping Thompson and the school board.

[sgfantoo]

I hope Ronnie has learned some things since leaving South Garland. I was personaly glad to see RT leave. Unless he has had some good introspection and changed a few things, it will not be good for the football program.

[Shoot2thrill]

oh FYI, we will more than likely have SLC's style of offense next year.:) :eek:

Running SLC's style of offense is nothing to crow about hoss. It is finding and developing their quality level of athletes that is going to set you apart from the pack. :eek:

[jtk1519]

Half the state of Texas runs SLC's style of offense. Nobody runs it like SLC.

[SeguinMatadors]

We got Ronnie Thompson!!!!! yeah!!!

WE WANT STATE! WE WANT STATE! WE WANT STATE!


Hell of a sign, IMO.