Legendary WPIAL football coach Zmijanac joins Ambridge coaching staff as volunteer assistant
AMBRIDGE — A legendary Beaver County football coach is joining Ambridge Area High School’s coaching staff.
Second-year head coach Sherman McBride told the Beaver County Times on Monday that Mike Zmijanac, a former Aliquippa head coach and one of the winningest coaches in WPIAL football history, will be joining his staff this season as a volunteer assistant. McBride — a 1980 Aliquippa graduate — spent 21 seasons as an assistant coach under Zmijanac at Aliquippa and two years in the same role under Zmijanac at Seton LaSalle.
“Z is just sprinkling his magic on every little thing that we do,” McBride told The Times before the Bridgers’ first practice of the 2022 season. “And it’s just a plus. It has to be a plus. Him being on our staff could (add) one or two or three more wins.”
Zmijanac spent 21 seasons (1997-2017) as the head coach at Aliquippa, where he led the Quips to six WPIAL titles and one PIAA title. After being ousted by the Aliquippa school board in a controversial move following the 2017 season, Zmijanac became Ringgold’s head coach in 2018 before spending the final two years of his coaching career at Seton LaSalle during the 2019 and 2020 seasons. He compiled a 240-59 overall record in his 24 years as a head coach.
McBride considers Zmijanac a mentor, and the two maintained a close friendship even after Zmijanac retired from coaching in 2020. In his first year as a head coach last season, McBride led then-Class 3A Ambridge Area to a 2-7 record and the program’s first postseason berth since 2015.
“Now it’s him running to me, instead of me running to him,” McBride joked while discussing Zmijanac’s new role.
The Bridgers — now moved up to Class 4A — posted a 1-44 record in the five years prior to McBride’s arrival in 2021 and had scored more than 10 points only four times in that span. After having 36 players on the team roster last year, the group now has 46 players on the roster a little more than two weeks ahead of its season opener against West Virginia’s Wheeling Central Catholic on Aug. 26.
McBride believes Zmijanac will add an even stronger foundation to what he hopes to continue to build at Ambridge Area.
“It gives me the opportunity as a head coach … to continue to make mistakes,” McBride said. “Because I’ve got a guy behind me that’s going to correct me — a Hall-of-Fame guy that’s going to correct me. The little things that I don’t see, he’s going to see them.”
Contact Parth Upadhyaya at pupadhyaya@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @pupadhyaya.
This article originally appeared on Beaver County Times: Mike Zmijanac joins Ambridge coaching staff as volunteer assistant
