Johnson returns home to coach Montgomery Academy

After coaching stints at schools including St. James, Tuscaloosa Academy and Lee-Scott Academy, Johnson (third from left) returns home to coach his alma mater, Montgomery Academy. (Contributed)

By TIM GAYLE

There is no acclimation period necessary for Montgomery Academy’s new athletic director and football coach.

The first-ever Montgomery Academy graduate to serve as the school’s head of school went out and hired the first-ever Montgomery Academy graduate to serve as AD and football coach, so it wasn’t a hard sell for either John McWilliams or Robert Johnson. 

“When I was a student at MA, Coach Johnson served as an assistant to the late Coach John Tatum,” McWilliams observed, “and it is fitting that he is now returning to MA to hold the positions that Coach Tatum once held.  Coach Johnson will build on the legacy of excellence defined by the outstanding leaders of MA's athletic program both past and present.”

Johnson, the current head football coach at Lee-Scott Academy in Auburn, was announced by McWilliams in an open letter to parents and students on Friday.

“The plan was to be at Lee-Scott long term,” Johnson said. “I love the people there, the kids are fantastic, some of the best kids I’ve coached. I really hate leaving them. I wasn’t looking for a job. That wasn’t on my radar but all of a sudden the MA job opened up and they started contacting me.”

McWilliams was saddled with the daunting task of finding a person to fill the dual role of athletic director and head football coach in early February when Gary Nelson announced he was leaving to take the job as head football coach at Southside-Gadsden. McWilliams reportedly reached out to Anthony McCall, who had left four years earlier for a job in Florida, to see if McCall was happy in his current job, then turned his attention to Johnson, an all-state center on Montgomery Academy’s 1987 state championship team under Tatum who has spent the last 30 years coaching high school football.  

“The opportunity to go back home and coach at your alma mater, it’s rare and it’s special,” Johnson said. “It just doesn’t happen all that often. And I think it’s a good time. I’ve been away long enough that I’m an outsider, but I’m still an insider. I went there, played there, coached there, taught there and then was at another school in Montgomery for a while, then was away for another 10 years out of town.

“It’s just that coming-back-home feeling, along with being entrusted to carry on a program that people like David Bethea and John Tatum and Spence McCracken – my eight-grade history teacher – and Anthony McCall and even Gary Nelson have built. That legacy is pretty important.”

Johnson was an easy choice. After graduating from Auburn, he took a job as an assistant coach at Montgomery Academy under Tatum from 1991-94, then served as the defensive coordinator at St. James in 1995-96 before taking over as head coach from 1997-2006. He left for Carroll High in Ozark (2007-09) and Pike County (2010) before landing a job at Tuscaloosa Academy (2011-18). He left for a rebuilding task at Lee-Scott, where he coached the Warriors to a 5-6 record this past season.

Overall, he has a 152-98 record that includes nine consecutive winning seasons at St. James, a school record; a 72-41 record that ranks him as the Trojans’ winningest coach; and a 61-25 record at Tuscaloosa Academy that ranks him as the Knights’ winningest coach.

As athletic director at TA, he oversaw a program that won 25 state titles over his tenure and he was Alabama Independent School Association coach of the year on three occasions. Twice, he was named Capital City Conference coach of the year during his time at St. James. 

He visited with coaches, teachers and McWilliams over the past two weeks, but the avalanche of phone calls from alumni may have been the tipping point in his accepting the job.

“I had a bunch of people from MA call me, former coaches, current coaches, some (former) players that I played football with that have kids there,” Johnson said. “The campus is beautiful and the new (athletic) facility on the other side of (Vaughn) Road is impressive. There are a lot of new buildings there that were not there when I was in school there so things have changed a lot and mainly for the better.”

Johnson toured the facility with his daughter Chloe, a sophomore point guard who ranks as one of the state’s best basketball players. 

“I’m not sure what we’re going to do with Chloe,” he said. “She might stay here (at Lee-Scott). We’re definitely interested in her input. First of all, I can live here and still work at MA. The other thing is, I hate to move her twice in her high school career.

“Lee-Scott is great. So was TA, but Lee-Scott is great. So I don’t know what we’re going to do. Chloe enjoyed the visit but that didn’t have much to do with the decision of me taking the job.”

Johnson and his wife Elizabeth have a pair of older sons, Alex and Noah. Noah Johnson served on Lee-Scott’s coaching staff last year and is expected to continue that role at Montgomery Academy. Robert Johnson, meanwhile, would like to hold spring football practice at Montgomery Academy in mid-May but will continue working with the Lee-Scott players through the end of the school year. 

“I want them to continue to work out and get stronger for the next coach,” Johnson said. “I’m going to be rooting those guys on from afar. But I’m within striking distance (to carry on work at MA) whether we do early-morning stuff or late-afternoon stuff and I can attend some (spring) games (in other sports).”

McWilliams didn’t need a search committee to identify the next coach of the Eagles. He knew exactly what he was looking for and knew Johnson was the perfect candidate.

“Throughout his career, he has consistently used his roles in athletics and in the classroom as a means to build character and leadership skills in his students,” McWilliams said. “He knows our school, he knows our community, and he understands our mission.  I have no doubt that, through his leadership of our athletic program, Coach Johnson will seek to live out our mission to develop great leaders of character.”