By Ken Jackson
Sports Writer

With the 2009-10 athletic season behind us, what is there to bridge the gap to 2010-11?

The coaching carousel season, of course.

A handful of the county’s varsity coaches have stepped down or are changing positions, either by choice or the elimination of their teaching positions.

For instance, Ettie Singleton, who coached volleyball and girls track at Gateway for the past 14 seasons, is leaving to take the open volleyball job at St. Cloud.

Singleton, who won one Orange Belt Conference title and led the Panthers to the regional playoffs three times, said her family — which is zoned for St. Cloud — was the reason.

“It had nothing to do with being unhappy at Gateway,” she said. “It had come open before and I could have taken it but didn’t. It was just the right time, my daughters will be be there in a few years.”

And while St. Cloud gains a coach, it loses baseball coach Jim Moran after just one year.  His Bulldogs team, dominated by freshmen and sophomores, was the only county squad to make the regional playoffs, but he was left no choice but to step down after his job teaching health was eliminated.

He found a new teaching job at Denn John Middle School, which dismisses 45 minutes later than St. Cloud High, creating a dilemma for him and Principal Pam Tapley.

“She said she wanted desperately to keep me, but I told her there’d be a problem if I couldn’t get out of (Denn John) early during the season to run practice,” Moran said. “It breaks me up because I was looking forward to building on what we accomplished last season and we had the returning talent to do it.”

Mike Meechin, who led the Celebration boys soccer team to back-to-back district titles the last two years, has stepped down to pursue his master’s degree. He coached the team from 2004-06 as well.

“It’s just time, you can’t do this forever,” Meechin said. “I want to pursue an  administration career.”

Harmony is playing the carousel game within its basketball program, as boys coach Paul Strauch and girls coach Steve Smith will swap roles next season. Smith was 50-24 with the Lady Longhorns over three seasons, and they qualified for the regional playoffs for the first time this season. Strauch, who has coached the flag football team to four straight district finals, will see some of the same talent on the hardwood.

“It’s been a good three years with the girls, but it was time for a change,” Smith said. “We had a good run.”

St. Cloud girls hoops coach Shanel Davidson said her teaching position was not renewed so she is also out as a coach, meaning that next year’s coach will be the sixth in six seasons. The Bulldogs, once a proud program and the 1994 Class 3A state champions, haven’t been to the regional playoffs since Tim McMullen led them there in Class 6A in 2005.

And then there’s Poinciana, which has the daunting task of filling many of its head coaching positions for next year. Principal Belynda Pinkston said she sees filling the coaching staff with educators who can help lift the school’s ‘F’ grade a step toward changing the school’s fortunes.

“We’re looking for people who can live up to our standard of excellence, and then we want to extend that into our extracurricular activities,” she said. “We’re looking for excellence, we want that ‘A’ grade.”

Head coaching positions in volleyball, girl’s cross country, girl’s golf, swimming, boy’s soccer, boy’s wrestling, baseball, softball, boy’s and girl’s Tennis and flag football, along with a many assistant jobs, were advertised on the FHSAA website.

Pinkston was on hand at the Eagles’ spring football game against Celebration, lauding the job that new coach Michael Timpson, one of her first hires, has done in just first months on the job.

“Coach Timpson is here because of the human being that he is,” she said.

Timpson will be one of five 2010 football coaches who will be different than who coached their school’s last game of 2009: Osceola’s Doug Nichols, Celebration’s Ben Aarestad, Liberty’s Dave Benson and whoever takes over the St. Cloud job.

Only Gateway’s Marlin Roberts and Harmony’s Dayne Brown, are back for their second and third seasons, respectively.