Apopka High School officially announced Tuesday it had hired Marcus Neeson as the new head football coach.
The official announcement comes more than a month after former head coach Jeff Rolson resigned. Rolson stepped down at the end of May after a spring game loss to Jones High School that resulted in the departure of 20 players to the transfer portal.
This is Neesons’s first head coaching position as he has been the defensive coordinator for the Blue Darters since Rolson took the head coaching job in 2019.
The official announcement also comes after unconfirmed reports of Neeson’s appointment almost a month ago. Neeson’s presumed hiring stemmed from a June 19 On3 article by Andy Villamarzo, who attributed his information to an interview with Neeson.
On that same day, The Apopka Chief was in contact with Apopka Athletic Director Aaron Crawford, who declined to confirm the reports at the time. Apopka High School principal Lyle Heinz also contacted the Chief in June to confirm that Neeson’s appointment was not official.
After all of that, Neeson was still the Blue Darters’ choice. Tuesday, after a lengthy and meticulous hiring and interviewing process, Apopka High School officially announced Neeson as the new head coach of the Blue Darter football team.
“It’s an amazing opportunity,” Neeson said in a phone interview Tuesday. “I’m grateful to have access to this great program and be behind the reins.”
The Apopka Chief spoke with Neeson after the announcement was made official on Tuesday, and he was all business, happy that the process was complete.
Neeson said he felt relieved when the appointment was made official.
“There was a little hiccup with the early announcement, you could say. But, as that all got ironed out, and I sat down with Heinz, he told me, ‘Look, you’re my guy,’” Neeson said. “There are checks and balances and a process for doing things. So, he filled me in on the whole process of doing interviews and interacting with the community. And so, I’m happy that he could make it official.”
Neeson said the process was not an easy one for the school, and neither was the decision. Neeson said difficulty in making the decision was due in part to the history and pedigree of the Apopka football program.
He said that it’s not easy to hire another coach for a program like Apopka given the culture and tradition within the program are very important to the city.
“You’ve got a superior program, a program that’s above a lot of other programs in the area,” Neeson said. “And it’s a job that you’re going to get some high-quality coaches interviewing for, and you want to make sure you make the right decision when it comes to hiring a head coach to lead the program moving forward.”
Being a new head coach in a program that some might describe as having a limp after the mass exodus of players will be a challenge for Neeson. But it is one he welcomes. He said the theme for the team this season is A.P.K. – accountability, pride and knowing.
Neeson emphasized the importance of accountability and extensive knowledge. He said it applies to both sides, not just the players, but also the coaches.
He said he wants to start with having the players be accountable by knowing everything. As a game and practice film connoisseur and a student of the game, he wants his players to know and see the game the way he does.
Neeson said it means that everyone on the field on offense needs to know everything about what’s going on. It doesn’t matter if the player is a quarterback, an offensive lineman, or a wide receiver. Neeson’s philosophy is that players who want to be on the field need to know everything about the play the team is running as well as everything about the opponents’ defense.
“There’s going to be some accountability on their end,” Neeson said. “The offense is going to be simplified, but they’re going to have to know where we’re attacking. If it’s a run play, they have to know where we’re going and what the assignment is. So, the O-line needs to be able to identify, the quarterback needs to be able to identify, as well as the receivers. They need to understand the play and communicate the coverage that they’re going against.”
More important than anything is keeping the Apopka Blue Darter standard intact, Neeson said. That standard of hard work, discipline, and community breeds excellence.
Neeson said that leading up to the official announcement of his appointment as head coach, he reached out to former players to determine what he needed to do in the role. The overwhelming answer was that the standard of being a Blue Darter needs to stay the same. Those former players he asked said their time as a Blue Darter was a key element in their development as men.
“I sat down with some alumni, Antwone Robinson, the other day, and asked him and one other guy, ‘Hey, what would you say that I need to do as a head coach?’ And he said, ‘Keep the Apopka standard, the standard.’ And that meant a lot. He said that he wouldn’t have been where he’s at today – he wouldn’t be the guy he is today without Apopka holding him accountable and keeping the standard.”
Entering the head coaching position after a 4-6 season and losing 28 players since the end of the season would be a challenge for anyone. However, Neeson said Apopka has faced a similar situation in recent years and, within a few seasons, was back in the playoffs.
“We’ve gone through the transfer issue before,” Neeson said. “We went through it back in 2017, and two years later, we were playing for a state championship. I don’t feel like there’s going to be any drop-off. I feel like we’ve been through this, and we move forward. We’ve got a lot of young guys that are going to step up this year, and we’ve got a lot of time to invest in them. They can only go up from here.”