William Byrd's Jeff Highfill, the school's head football coach and boy's soccer coach, will resign from the latter of those two positions after the current season, according to a story in today's Roanoke Times.
Highfill has held both coaching jobs since the 1981-82 school year.
I knew Highfill was Byrd's soccer coach, but I thought he'd only been doing that for perhaps ten years or so. I was surprised to learn that he has held the soccer job so long; in fact, Highfill is the only boys soccer coach in the program's history. I was also surprised to learn that Highfill led the Terriers to ten regional crowns and two state runner-up finishes on the pitch, in '91 and '96. Rounding out the list of things I learned (or had known and forgotten) is the fact that Highfill was Floyd County's head football coach in '79 and '80.
Highfill is a graduate of Andrew Lewis in Salem, now a middle school. Though his football teams have no state or regional titles to their credit, they should erect a statue of Highfill in Vinton one day, for his decades of service to the kids and community.
This raised a question in my mind: how many coaches out there double up in both the "footballs"? I would think it's pretty rare, especially in 3A and above; very rare for someone to do both for over 35 years. Does anyone know of another coach who leads both football and soccer?
http://m.roanoke.com/sports/high_sc...43c-998d-587e-8361-f69dbe0763e7.html?mode=jqm
Highfill has held both coaching jobs since the 1981-82 school year.
I knew Highfill was Byrd's soccer coach, but I thought he'd only been doing that for perhaps ten years or so. I was surprised to learn that he has held the soccer job so long; in fact, Highfill is the only boys soccer coach in the program's history. I was also surprised to learn that Highfill led the Terriers to ten regional crowns and two state runner-up finishes on the pitch, in '91 and '96. Rounding out the list of things I learned (or had known and forgotten) is the fact that Highfill was Floyd County's head football coach in '79 and '80.
Highfill is a graduate of Andrew Lewis in Salem, now a middle school. Though his football teams have no state or regional titles to their credit, they should erect a statue of Highfill in Vinton one day, for his decades of service to the kids and community.
This raised a question in my mind: how many coaches out there double up in both the "footballs"? I would think it's pretty rare, especially in 3A and above; very rare for someone to do both for over 35 years. Does anyone know of another coach who leads both football and soccer?
http://m.roanoke.com/sports/high_sc...43c-998d-587e-8361-f69dbe0763e7.html?mode=jqm
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