Here’s why Myers Park High School is looking for its fourth football coach in 4 seasons
Myers Park High School will be working with its fourth football coach in four seasons this fall.
Mustangs coach Curtis Fuller, 44, is leaving to take an assistant coaching position at Texas A&M-Commerce, which will begin play at the NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision level this fall.
Fuller will work under head coach David Bayliff, whom he met when Bayliff joined the staff at his alma mater, Texas Christian. Bayliff joined the TCU staff the same year Fuller left for the NFL draft.
The move also puts Fuller closer to his family.
“It came together over the weekend,” said Fuller, 44, who has been an NFL assistant with the Panthers and Cardinals. “I went and visited, and David and I have a 15-year relationship. He reached out and threw an opportunity out there. We’re going to be coaching the (defensive backs). There’s still some moving parts with it, but we’ll implement some things we did in the pros.”
Fuller coached the Mustangs for one season in 2021, leading Myers Park to an 8-4 record and the second-round of the 4A playoffs.
He followed Mark Harman, who was named interim coach at Myers Park during the spring 2021 season. Harman got the job just one week before the season began after longtime coach Scott Chadwick left to take a job as an assistant coach at Maryland.
From 2014-2020, Chadwick built the Mustangs into a national power. His last four teams were 48-7 and included an appearance in the state semifinals.
Following Chadwick, Harman led the Mustangs to a 9-1 record and a berth in the N.C. 4AA state semifinals, which matched the deepest playoff run of any Mustangs team in school history.
After that one season, Myers Park promoted Fuller, who had been defensive coordinator, to head coach and Fuller led Myers Park to a share of a conference championship last fall, continuing a run of strong Mustang teams.
Fuller said the next coach should inherit a team ready to continue to win. Myers Park athletic director Brian Poore told The Observer that the school would begin to immediately look for a new coach, and hoped to have that person in place by late May or early June.
Fuller said Myers Park will return seven starters on offense, four starters on defense and thinks the Mustangs have plenty of returning talent and should emerging talent moving up from junior varsity.
“It’s tough to leave,” Fuller said. “I felt we were building something pretty special. This had been the second class to come through and do things the way we wanted to do. We had some holes to fill, but the nucleus of the kids were getting it, and kids were working hard in the weight room. So I think they can be really good. ... They’re growing up and growing up fast.”
This story was originally published March 2, 2022 at 6:33 PM.
