It’s something special to be a winner on the field.
It’s even better to be a winner off of it as well.
Those two facets are among the goals of new Lorain football coach Damion Creel, who was approved as the Titans’ new leader at the regular board of education meeting on Feb. 22.
“We want to be a group of tough kids who are relentless,” Creel told The Morning Journal in a phone interview. “We want to be a team that does things the right way. We want to be a team of great people on and off the field.”
Creel replaces first-year coach James Boyeas whose contract apparently was not renewed by the Lorain City School District despite never coaching a game for the Titans.
The Titans did not have a season this past fall because of concerns about the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Lorain athletic director Bryan Koury said “no comment” when asked about Boyeas’ status as head coach. Boyeas also said “no comment” when asked about his status.
Koury announced the intention of recommending Creel for approval earlier in the day on Feb. 22.
“Coach Creel brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to Lorain City Schools,” Koury wrote in a news release. “He is currently a teacher at Beachwood High School and led their football program for the past six years.
“Everyone that we spoke with raved about Coach Creel as both a person and coach. I am extremely confident that our students and community will embrace Coach Creel. We are very excited about the future of Lorain football.”
Creel stepped down as Beachwood’s head coach in January, ending a six-year stint as the leader of the football program at his alma mater.
Beachwood qualified for postseason play in both 2019 and 2020, breaking an 11-year playoff drought in the process.
Creel said he didn’t plan on getting back in the coaching ring so quickly, but that the opportunity at Lorain was too good to pass up.
“It’s a tremendous opportunity,” Creel said. “It’s a Division I program that gets me back in the Lake Erie League where I kind of started at Cleveland Heights. This is big-boy football, as they said, and I’m truly honored and humbled that the staff and administration at Lorain has entrusted me to lead their program.”
Prior to his tenure at Beachwood, Creel spent five seasons coaching at Glenville.
In his first season with the Tarblooders, he was the special teams coordinator, the quarterbacks coach and defensive backs coach.
Creel then split his remaining four seasons at the school as the defensive coordinator before transitioning to offensive coordinator for the final two years.
Creel, a 1994 Beachwood alum, also spent time coaching as an assistant at St. Edward (QBs coach), Richmond Heights (defensive coordinator and QBs coach), Cleveland Heights (assistant coach), Bedford (defensive coordinator and QBs coach) and Marion-Franklin High School (offensive coordinator).
Creel is involved in several initiatives off the field as he is the president of the African Americans Football Coaching Alliance, which was established in the spring of 2020. The goal of the AAFCA is to empower, develop and unify coaches, student-athletes and communities regardless of race, class or creed.
Creel is also a member of the executive board of the Build the Bridge program. The program is a coalition of coaches, players, parents, administration and community members to foster the success of student-athletes through social-emotional, educational, and athletic advancement.
Creel said he will meet with players and their families as soon as possible. Family, he said, is the root of the program.
“I want to bring the same principles and beliefs that we have had at Beachwood — that family atmosphere,” Creel said. “Lorain is a big city, but it has that small-town feel to it. It’s a blue-collar town with tough kids. But that family atmosphere is so important to us.”
Credit: Source link
