YPSILANTI – As much as Andre Parker loved coaching Ypsilanti’s football team, there’s one thing he loves more – his children.
Ypsilanti began conducting a nationwide search for its varsity head football coaching position in January, though Parker remained in the running the retain the job.
But after mulling over his future, and with his sons – 13 and 9 – growing up, Parker decided it was the right time to bow out of the running to remain head coach and allow someone else to lead the Grizzlies into the future.
“I had a conversation with my kids and just asked them what they thought about dad not coaching,” Parker told MLive Wednesday. “And my youngest was ecstatic. He was like, ‘Yes.’ And my oldest was like, ‘Dad, I just want you happy.’
“You spend so much time with other people’s children and getting them through trials and tribulations away from football...I just kind of reflected and it’s time for me to really just take the time for my kids.”
Parker – who assumed the role of interim head coach after former coach Fred Jackson stepped down right before the start of the 2018 season – wasn’t let go and had properly interviewed to remain head coach, Ypsilanti athletic director Lawrence Reeves told MLive-The Ann Arbor News last month.
“We’re going through the process right now,” Reeves said during that interview. “We never did the due process of doing a nationwide search, and we’re doing that now based on the fact that (Parker) has been in an interim role, but we never took the time to do (a search). It’s just a situation where we’re doing the due process that we didn’t do based on an interim role being given to (Parker) after coach Jackson had stepped down.”
But during the process, Parker concluded that building a strong relationship with his two sons needed to be his main priority moving forward.
“After I talked to my kids, it wasn’t hard at all,” said Parker on stepping away. “You’re the football coach and people see you as the football coach but I’m a father first and foremost and I need to take care of my own first, so it really wasn’t hard.
“On the flip side of that, you’ve built so many relationships with the kids and you see them, some of them since seventh and eighth grade, and you see the maturity of some these kids. In that sense, it is hard. And also, it’s hard because you know what you have coming back. Like, this is what you’ve been building for, these next couple years. So, in that sense it’s hard from a coaching and competitive standpoint.”
Parker will continue to teach in the building and vows to remain active within in a different role for the students at Ypsilanti. He said he even created a list of football camps for the players to attend this summer.
“I told them, ‘I’m not leaving you guys. I’m just stepping away for a while and I'll still support you in different ways. Most importantly, academically and socially in your lives,’” Parker said. “I will not be in the shadows stepping on the next coach’s toes either. I said, ‘You will have a new staff, you will have a new coach and I will defer to them when it comes to anything football related.’
“But my time (as head coach) was great. I love this school; I love this community and these kids. I’ll do anything for them and still will.”
Parker, who was 7-11 in two seasons at Ypsilanti, said he believes the next coach for the Grizzlies will enter a position where the team is ready to win now.
“The cup is not bare,” he said. “We should be very competitive next year, if not win the league...We have guys coming back, so for the next guy that comes in, the cup is not bare, and they should be very successful.”
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