Cross Country Coach of the Year: Coleman at helm of Marietta's state title sweep
Dec. 16—Jack Coleman has been leading the Marietta cross country teams since he first arrived on campus in 2000.
He rebuilt the program, found the athletes who wanted to be coached hard and developed a training regimen that not only helps the runners improve, while also keeping one another accountable.
Once the program took shape, Marietta's cross country teams have become perennial state championship contenders. The boys team won its first state title under Coleman's watch in 2014, with the girls following in 2017.
Since then, the Blue Devils have won a combined nine state titles under Coleman, including the second sweep of the boys and girls titles in the last three years this fall at the Class AAAAAAA championships in Carrollton.
For his efforts, the veteran Marietta coach was named the Cobb County Boys and Girls Cross Country Coach of the Year by his peers.
"We got the right people," said Coleman, who begins identifying potential team members when they are in middle school. "They train year-round. We don't have a big team, because it's hard, but we are able to put a good group together."
For the girls team, it may have been more than good this year.
In winning the state title for the third straight year and fifth out of the last six, Coleman may have had one of the greatest teams in state history. It was one that could contend with the Collins Hills program that won six straight state championships from 2003-08, and his own Marietta squad from 2017-18.
"It's right up there as one of the top five or six teams in state (history)," Coleman said.
At the state meet in Carrollton, the Blue Devils' five runners all finished in the top 13. Maddie Jones was second overall with a time of 19 minutes, 15.03 seconds, while Mary Nesmith (19:34.55), Kristal McQueen 19:38.93) and Nora Hart (19:55.60) finished fifth, sixth and seventh, respectively. Colette DePasquale (20:11.05) was 13th.
Marietta's team score of 33 earned it a 68-point victory over runner-up Harrison.
McQueen is the only runner who will graduate this year, leaving the Marietta girls in a good position be contend for a fourth straight title in 2023.
Coleman said the success of this year's boys squad was a little bit of a surprise. Not because the team did not have talent, but as the year went on, there were other Class AAAAAAA teams finishing ahead of the Blue Devils at other meets.
Coleman said the mindset changed at the Coach Wood Invitational in October.
"We ran the second half of that race really well," he said. "After the first mile, we were in 15th. By the end of the race, we finished sixth. I told them, if we ran like the second half of the race, we could compete with anybody."
Coleman was proven correct.
Jared Fortenberry, Sterling Sellier and Jack Baltz finished 1-2-3 to lead Marietta to the Region 3AAAAAAA title. Then, at the state meet, Marietta had all five runners finish in the top 26, led by Fortenberry's second-place finish.
"We competed in a lot of premier meets," Coleman said. "I wanted to make sure that, when we got to state, it wasn't the most difficult meet of the year.
"The kids were building for it."
Potentially repeating in 2023 will be a little more difficult. Marietta will graduate four of its top seven runners — Fortenberry, Baltz, Hines Doyle and Jack Boland — but three are set to return in Evan Grundmeyer, Evan Owens and Parker Pitts.
