Holmes rounds out New Brockton football staff

New Brockton High School has announced the hiring of a trio of former Enterprise coaches to round out new head coach Zack Holmes’ inaugural staff at New Brockton just in time for spring practices to begin later this month.

Former Enterprise coaches Jonathan Hawkins, Brad Clay and Tyler Stump have joined Holmes at New Brockton. All three were assistant coaches at Enterprise last season alongside Holmes.

Clay and Hawkins also coached at Eufaula High School with Holmes before coming to Enterprise, and Hawkins has a long history with the new head man at New Brockton.

“Me and Coach Hawk go all the way back to Sumiton Christian School,” Holmes said of Hawkins. “This will be our ninth year coaching together. That was big time for us to be able to bring him over.

“We have a relationship where we kind of know what each other is thinking out there, and he obviously knows what we want to do defensively.”

Hawkins – who was the defensive line coach at Eufaula from 2015 until 2017 and defensive line coach at Enterprise last season – will head up the New Brockton defense as its new defensive coordinator and defensive backs coach. Hawkins will also serve as assistant head coach to Holmes.

Clay – who coached outside linebackers at both Eufaula and Enterprise – will be moving over to the offensive side of the ball. Clay was a quarterback in high school at Southside High in Gadsden, and he started his coaching career as a quarterback coach at Southside. Clay will coach the quarterbacks at New Brockton, as well.

“Brad is an outstanding young coach and we are so happy to be able to get him to come over here,” Holmes said. “I really didn’t know if we were going to be able to get him but I’m happy that he believes in our model of football and that he wants to come over here and be a part of that.”

Stump is a graduate of Enterprise but is no stranger to New Brockton, either. Stump was an assistant football and baseball coach at New Brockton in 2016 and 2017 before moving over to Enterprise.

At Enterprise, Stump served as an assistant basketball coach and wide receivers coach on the EHS freshman football team. At New Brockton, Stump will serve as the varsity defensive line coach.

Stump is also nationally certified as a strength and conditioning specialist, which has Holmes excited about his potential on the New Brockton staff as its new strength and conditioning coach, too.

“I’m as excited about Tyler as much as anyone else on the staff,” Holmes said. “I think the weight room is the key for everything in our athletic program here and we have a guy that is certified in strength and conditioning here that is going to be training our athletes. I think all three of these guys coming on board for us is big time.”

Holmes was also able to retain almost the entire staff leftover from former coach Justin Jones, with the exception of former defensive coordinator Brad Barton, who departed to accept an administration position at Carroll High School.

Assistant coaches Josh Moguel, Tyler Hatcher, Eric Reynolds, Will Hulsey and Keith Simmons will all stay on board at New Brockton as assistants under Holmes.

Moguel will remain as wide receiver coach, a position he has held for a number of years at New Brockton.

Keith Simmons – who coached linebackers last season – will coach running backs this coming up season but will also serve as the head junior varsity coach, as well.

Hatcher will serve as cornerbacks coach after coaching all the defensive backs last season.

Hulsey – who is also the head baseball coach at New Brockton – will coach the inside linebackers on varsity.

Reynolds will retain his position as offensive line coach.

“All the guys on our staff are great people first but also good teachers and great coaches,” Holmes said. “New Brockton had a good staff here already, so it’s really cool to be able to keep most of those guys on and just add to that.”

Holmes said that the familiarity that the old staff already has with the players has already been beneficial to the team.

“The familiarity they have with the kids is big for us, whether it’s knowing which kid needs to be in what spot or just the trust they already have with the kids,” Holmes emphasized. “There obviously is already a comfort level and a trust there that they have with the kids and that can help us build on that with our new coaches.

“It’s important to bring in your own guys onto the staff but I think it slows down the process if you completely turn over the staff. You lose the trust, the knowledge and the tradition of those guys that were already here. I think we’re bringing in guys that know what we want to do here and we also have guys that were already here that are great coaches and already have relationships built in with the kids. So, it’s a nice mix.”