Paul Rhoads
The Gulf Coast Athletic Club opened its October 24, 2022 meeting in the Clubhouse at Craft Farms Golf Resort at 7:00pm. President George Autrey welcomed the crowd of 42 members and guests.
The Football Poll has Cynthia Tunnell winning each of the last two weeks and she has pulled ahead of the other 25 prognosticators. Taylor Means allegedly is DAL with the GSHS PA announcer and Professor Lee lurking in that neighborhood. Congratulations to HiYield!! Many more games to go.
GSHS Athletic Director Coach Tubbs gave the Dolphin Report. Girls Volleyball is going to the State Tournament in the Top 8. Football is 8-1 and will host the first round of the State Playoffs here in two weeks, the first playoff game here in 22 years! Boy’s Swimming is #1!! GO, DOLPHINS!!!
After a lengthy introduction, Team Reports was deftly handled by Dec McClelland who told the crowd the SEC had 7 in the Top 25. After another 2 weeks, the coveted Crying Towel was awarded to Ole Miss for not showing up at the LSU game. Maybe they had the wrong address. You could hear the large exhale from all the Tide fans, noting more orange in the crowd as the season wears on. Hotty Toddy!!
Kevin Corcoran, the aforementioned GSHS PA Guru who also doubles (in his spare time) as President of the Gulf Shores School Board, introduced tonight’s special Guest Speaker, another of the incredible coaching hires for GSHS, Coach Paul Rhoads. Commenting that GSHS is making the right decisions and heading in the right direction, Kevin says Coach Rhoads is a perfect example of that.
Coach gave the club a laugh when he said he had either coached for or against every team in the Team Reports! Probably not far from the perfect truth as he coached for 33 years at NCAA schools. The list includes Auburn (under Coach/Senator Tommy Tuberville), Pitt, Arizona, Arkansas, UCLA, and Ohio State, plus Paul spent 7 years as Head Coach at Iowa State.
His HC stint at Iowa State from 2009-2015 had him returning to his home town – he was born 10 minutes from Iowa State - where his mother was ill, so he was able to be with his parents as they went through her illness and death. Dad was a High School Coach and is still living at age 95. Paul said he left Auburn after 2008 to go to ISU and ISU Head Coach Gene Chizak came to Auburn at the same time.
He was an analyst for Ohio State last year when he saw an ad for Defensive Coordinator at Gulf Shores High School. Echoing comments made earlier this year by former USA HC Joey Jones, High School Football allows Coaches to do what they love best - a great passion of shaping young boys to become good gentlemen, fathers, etc. Coach Rhoads said it’s an opportunity to teach, coach, and mentor, make them better young men. It’s all about growing up with honesty and good judgement.
Saying it was the right move for him, he’s having a ball with this 66-player team and considers this a great privilege to teach them, even though it’s tough with limited daily practice time with his defense and also with 6 kids going both ways!!
In Q&A, he said the major difference now between college and high school is almost every college player thinks they can play in the NFL, but high schoolers are realistic enough to know only some of them can play at the next level.
Thank you, Coach Paul Rhoads, another absolutely superb program!!
Our annual fundraising golf tournament is November 18th and we need sponsors and players!!
The 50/50 pot was awarded to John Mitchell who donated it back to the club.
Next meeting on November 7th and will feature Coach Bill Clark, former HC at UAB.
The meeting adjourned at 8:30pm.
