Myers Park promotes former Panthers assistant to head football coach
Myers Park High School promoted former Carolina Panthers defensive backs coach Curtis Fuller as its head football coach, three years after Fuller resigned from the NFL team following an internal investigation into workplace misconduct.
Fuller’s resignation in May 2018 came shortly after owner Jerry Richardson was forced to sell the team following multiple sexual misconduct allegations. The NFL and an independent investigator the next month said the improper conduct within the Panthers’ organization was “limited to Mr. Richardson. No other employee of the Panthers is alleged to have engaged in such conduct, and the review did not discover evidence of similar conduct by other employees of the club.”
As of Monday morning, Fuller’s Twitter profile had been updated to say “Head Football Coach Myers Park High School.”
Fuller, who was defensive coordinator for the Mustangs last season, replaces Mark Harman, interim head coach during the 2021 season. Harman became interim coach just one week before the season began after former Mustangs leader Scott Chadwick left to take an assistant job at Maryland.
Harman led the Mustangs to a Southwestern 4A conference championship, despite losing some starters, like All-America QB Drake Maye, to early graduation, while several others transferred.
Myers Park finished the season 9-1, reached the N.C. 4AA Western Regional championship game, which was as deep in the playoffs as any Myers Park team has ever gone. After the season, Harman was named Southwestern 4A conference coach of the year by the league’s coaches.
Until a 42-7 loss to Vance in the regional championship or state semifinals, Myers Park’s defense was allowing an average of 12.1 points per game.
Myers Park athletic director Brian Poore told the Observer in a text message that the school planned to officially announce the new coach on Tuesday.
Tuesday morning, Myers Park principal Mark Bosco told the Observer via text message that Fuller is employed at the school as a full-time Exceptional Children’s job coach.
“We have observed his quality as an employee and coach,” Bosco wrote. “He was one of five candidates interviewed last week by a panel of six interviewers and he was unanimously our top choice. I did have a conversation with him yesterday about his resignation from the Panthers. I was satisfied with his response and I’m prepared to stand behind him as our next head football coach.”
Curtis Fuller with the Panthers and NFL
In 2018, while Fuller was a defensive back coach with the Panthers, multiple sources told the Observer that an internal investigation began after Fuller had inappropriate electronic communications with female Panthers employees.
The sources said Fuller sent emails and text messages to multiple female employees on the business side of the organization and that the amount of them, and not the content, was the biggest issue.
Fuller started with the Panthers in 2013. He was part of Carolina’s 2015 team that reached the Super Bowl.
Fuller played four years in the NFL -- with the Seahawks, Packers and Panthers -- after playing in college at Texas Christian. His playing career ended after the 2004 season with Carolina. Fuller then worked as a scout for the Cowboys in 2006, eventually working with the Raiders, Packers, Titans and Panthers. He was part of the Packers’ 2010 Super Bowl champion staff.
Fuller was hired by the Cardinals for the 2018 season -- shortly after he resigned his position with the Panthers -- when former Carolina defensive coordinator Steve Wilks was named head coach in Arizona. Wilks was fired after the 2018 season and Fuller was out of a job.
On Monday, Fuller told the Observer he wanted to put the Panthers’ investigation behind him and explained why he resigned at the time.
“I think it was in the best interest of everybody that it worked out that way,” Fuller said. “I’m not going to address anything. There’s a bunch of rumors and speculations, and everybody can have their own opinion. But that’s what I’ve going to share. That’s what I thought was in the best interest of everybody at the time.
“If I offended anybody at that point, I apologized for it then, and I apologize for it now. But...we’re going to move forward as a family, we’re going to move forward in the role that we’re in, and we’re not going to address something that’s happened three years ago. And I know people are going to want to bring it up and talk about it.“
‘I felt very confident in the kind of person that he was’
Chadwick said he hired Fuller in summer 2019 and said he was aware of Fuller’s resignation from the Panthers.
“We had enough mutual friends and acquaintances who were adamant about him as a person and his character,” Chadwick said, “there’s no one I trust more than (local pastor and former Panther) Derwin Gray and I didn’t know Curtis and I went to the same church at the time. But I talked to Derwin about him, and a couple other people, and I felt very confident in the kind of person that he was.”
Gray, a 50-year-old pastor at Transformation Church in Indian Land, S.C, near Charlotte, played for the Colts and Panthers from 1993-98.
”I think he’s an incredible football mind and he’s been part of a Super Bowl-winning culture, and he did great (as a coach) here with the Panthers,” Gray told the Observer about Fuller. “I think he got caught up in circumstances and timing, where he got pushed to the side in the midst of a bigger issue. I’ve had my own son work out with him. That’s how much I trust him.”
Fuller was a volunteer defensive back coach at Myers Park in the 2019 season and was promoted to defensive coordinator after that.
Chadwick thinks Fuller will be “really good” as head coach at Myers Park.
“His knowledge and his ability to interact with the kids really stood out,” Chadwick said, “which is why, going into this year, we re-organized the defensive staff and made him defensive coordinator. I think he’ll do a really good job as head coach. His knowledge is very high, but more than that, he’s got a great demeanor in how he interacts with the kids. I think he’s a high-quality coach and a high-quality person.”
Can Myers Park win a state title?
Fuller said he came to Myers Park at the urging of former Mustangs assistant Josh McCown, a former Panthers QB whose two sons were playing for the Mustangs at the time.
Fuller said he enjoyed coaching from the start at Myers Park.
“When Chadwick was here, he said, ‘You can do anything and everything you want to do,’” Fuller said “I was kind of skittish at first, from a standpoint of installing things, but the kids were great. I mean, we run a pro system, the system that I ran with Carolina, the system that I ran with Arizona and Washington runs a version of it right now. The kids were able to do all of it, and execute it at a really high level. It was exciting to install some of the pressures, and the exotic things, and the kids be able to execute on Friday night. That was awesome.”
Fuller, 42, will take over a team that has been nationally ranked on a regular basis and a consistent state title contender.
He said he has one goal: to help Myers Park win its first state championship.
“I’ll say it like this,” he said, “(the goal is) to hold the trophy at the end of the year. We get to the second round, we get to the third round (of the playoffs) every year that I’ve been associated with Myers Park. We’ve been ranked in the top five. And for whatever reason in the past, we can’t hold the trophy up.. So that is my ultimate goal. I think we have the kids to do it. I think the most important thing is get the kids to understand and believe that they can do this.
“And to me, that is, that is something that we have to overcome a little bit, being able to say, ‘We can do this, we can hold the trophy.’ And I think when we do that, you will see a bigger and better Myers Park football team.”
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This story was originally published May 17, 2021 at 8:34 PM.
