They were state runners up last season. Now they’ve named a new head coach.
Frederick Douglass High School wasted little time removing the “interim” tag from Nate McPeek’s title as the school announced Friday morning he would officially assume the title of head coach for last year’s Class 5A runner up.
“To me, it’s the best job in the state,” McPeek said after the announcement was made and he addressed his team in the school’s auditorium. “We’ve got a lot of great support here from our administration, our teachers, our coaches, but most importantly we have really good players that work really hard. I’m really excited to get started. It’s an honor to be the leader here.”
The move came less than a month after the departure of Brian Landis, who took an assistant position with Georgia State’s football program. In Landis’ three years as Douglass’ first and only head coach, the Broncos went 35-5, including a 14-1 record last season. Douglass has not lost to another city school in its brief history. McPeek has been the offensive coordinator and offensive line coach all three years.
“Obviously, I’ve got to be who I am. I feel like we (he and Landis) have lot of similarities — our core values, how we’re going to play disciplined football, how we’re going to play physical football,” McPeek said. “I don’t foresee that changing a whole lot.”
Douglass Athletics Director Jeremy Delaney and Principal Lester Diaz said the school took a lot of input from the community and the players on who they wanted to be their next head football coach, and the choice became clear.
“We actually sent out surveys to all the players, to all the booster parents, we talked to Carter G. Woodson (administrators) … and we just really came up with what are we looking for in the next coach, and more than anything, we don’t want to lose momentum,” Delaney said. “We’ve done really well the past three years, and so we just kind of came to the conclusion that we were going to remove the interim tag … We knew what we were definitely going to get with Nate.”
The players knew as well. McPeek has been running their offseason workouts the last few weeks.
“Coach McPeek was our guy all the way through,” said Jager Burton, who will be a senior next year and is one of the most coveted offensive line recruits in the nation. “We’re really happy with the decision.”
Dane Key, who had a breakout sophomore season at wide receiver, agreed.
“As an offensive guy, that’s my guy that’s going to give me the ball,” Key said, smiling. “I’ve been leaning for McPeek for a while.”
This will be McPeek’s second high school head coaching position and first since 2013 when he resigned after an investigation and sanctions by the KHSAA over an ineligible player that forced Ashland’s Fairview High School to forfeit 19 games, including the school’s entire run to the 2012 Class A state finals.
“I’ve learned a great deal from that,” McPeek said. “As a coach, you have to deal with growing, you have to deal with adversity a lot of times and that was a piece that I had work through and learn from, and I feel like I have.”
When McPeek took over Fairview in 2008, he turned what had been a program hovering around the .500 win/loss percentage mark each season into a consistent winner. The Eagles went 8-4 in his first two seasons, 11-2 in year three and 12-1 in year four.
Before becoming a Douglass assistant in 2017, McPeek spent two years as an offensive line coach at Atlanta’s Tucker High School and one season as Bryan Station’s O-line coach.
As offensive coordinator at Douglass, McPeek shepherded one of the state’s most dynamic offenses capable of fast scores with big plays that featured the team’s strengths.
In 2019, Douglass had a dual-threat quarterback in Josh McClurg who rushed and passed for more than 1,000 yards and an array of weapons such as Baylor commit Devin Neal and his brother Darius in the backfield behind Burton and outgoing Clemson commit Walker Parks. Douglass gained almost twice as many yards on the ground as in the air. The year prior, Douglass had pocket passer Cameron Jones and the Broncos’ stats were more balanced.
McPeek said he believes he will retain most of Douglass’ staff and he likes what the Broncos have coming back on the field.
“We have a lot of returning guys defensively. And, obviously, you’re not going to replace some guys that we lost,” McPeek said. “Offensively, I think we have seven guys coming back … It just depends on who we have and we’ll adapt to our players to give them the best chance to win.”
McPeek, a Russell native and Russell High School graduate, went on to become a four-year starter at Marshall University and an all-Mid-American Conference offensive lineman who participated in three bowl championships and two MAC championships.
After graduation, he began his coaching career as an assistant at Boyd County in 2004.
This story was originally published February 14, 2020 at 9:58 AM.
