Marsh Returns for Salamanca Football

When he stepped away from the Salamanca varsity football coaching job, Jason Marsh had a feeling it wouldn’t be for good. Now, just a year later, Marsh returns to lead the Warriors’ team in 2013.

“I always knew that someday that I’d want to do it again,” Marsh said. “I enjoy it. It’s fun. It always has its moments, but for the most part, I enjoy working with the kids, I enjoy trying to motivate them and I definitely enjoy the X’s and O’s of it.”

Marsh inherits a team fresh off a league championship from Paul Furlong, who left for a position at Allegany-Limestone.

It was an easy decision for athletic director Chris Siebert.

“Jason always was our football coach,” Siebert said. “He didn’t apply last year. He didn’t want the position at the time (for) his own personal reasons. This year, he did apply for it and did want it.”

Siebert added he appreciated the work Furlong did last season. Marsh agreed.

“You couldn’t have asked for someone to do a better job than he did,” Marsh said.

As with any other school coaching position, the head football coach is a yearly appointment. Marsh, a former Salamanca player, explains he left the top job at the football program to spend more time with his family.

“My son started playing pee wee football and my daughter is involved with soccer and I just felt like I was missing some things,” he said. “I just sat and looked at things and I feel that there are things that I can do differently and more efficiently so that I won’t miss those things in their lives.”

But he kept in the loop on the program, volunteering as a junior varsity assistant.

“Some people think I was crazy volunteering with the J.V. program every day and then I’d go down and coach my son’s pee wee football team, but actually I had a blast doing it,” Marsh said.

Filling Marsh’s coaching staff are varsity assistant Travis Happold, J.V. coach Paul Haley and “swing” coach Aaron Hill, who will help both teams.

The time spent away from the head job, but still close to the players, gives Marsh some new ideas heading into the season.

“I definitely think I have a different perspective on things,” he said. “I think I learned by being able to take a step back and not being that lead guy. I saw a lot of ways that I could do things differently and more efficiently. I try my hardest not to micromanage the situation. We put a lot of responsibilities onto the players themselves to take care of business.

“I never really gave (coaching) up anyway, so I figured why not?”

Marsh uses the team’s weight room sessions, currently running three times a week, as an example of his new, more relaxed approach.

“I can’t worry about everybody who’s there or not there,” Marsh said of the offseason training. “I used to spend a lot of time worrying about who’s there and who’s not there instead of just taking the kids that are there ... when they’re there, you coach ‘em up. If they’re not, we’ve got to find them, but so far the kids have done a great job getting to our weight-training sessions.”

The Warriors lose a graduating class including Big 30 classic invitees Tanner John, Dusty Lewis and Cameron Caputi, but Marsh is optimistic about his team already.

“I really think that we are a very talented ballclub,” he said. “We have very good skill people and we’ve got a lot of size up front. It’s definitely a good luxury to have.”

Offseason training picks up June 24, as the Warriors begin 7-on-7 drills.

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