
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 6, 1990                   TAG: 9006060103
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: RAY COX SPORTSWRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

ALLEGHANY HIRES NEW COACH

As much as he loved helping coach Phoebus High football and being near the coast, Tom McIntyre wanted to return to the mountains and to run his own team.

"Once you've been a head coach, it's difficult to be an assistant and not have your own team," he said. "Also, I really wanted to be in Western Virginia somewhere around Roanoke. I'm more attuned to a mountainous area."

McIntyre's wishes were granted Tuesday when he was hired as coach at Alleghany High.

"We feel like we've found a very special person for this job," Alleghany Principal Randolph Scott said.

McIntyre, 41, succeeds Kenny Higgins as coach of the traditionally powerful Mountaineers program. McIntyre's selection concluded a lengthy process in which 19 candidates were interviewed.

Scott said there were five finalists. Two were offered the job but turned it down. One of those was believed to be Homer Criddle, the coach at Greenbrier (W.Va.) East High.

McIntyre, a native of Woodbridge, N.J., has been an assistant at Phoebus the past three years, during which Phoebus went 25-10. Before that, he was head coach at South Charleston (W.Va.) High, where he went 33-47 in eight years.

At the time, South Charleston was the smallest Class AAA school in the state, he said.

McIntyre and his wife Patricia, both teachers, decided it was best for their careers to leave West Virginia. They also considered their sons - 9-year-old Tommy and 7-year-old Dan.

"We left West Virginia because of the educational atmosphere over there," he said. "They've had problems with the schools. They had a teachers' strike this year and we could see that coming."

They landed in the Hampton area, where he said they have been very happy.

McIntyre said he particularly enjoyed working with Phoebus coach Bill Dee, but the lure of another head coaching job was too much to resist.

McIntyre said his teams usually have run either the I-formation or wishbone offenses and the multiple-50 defense.

"I'm inclined to run the wishbone over there unless I find out the people they have are more conducive to running the I, then we'll do that," he said.

McIntyre has been a social studies teacher, but at Alleghany he will be working in a program to help students who have been targeted as potential dropouts, Scott said.

A reception for the new coach will be held at the 9:30 a.m. Monday at the high school.

by CNB