In the middle of this off-season, Lebanon footballs’ head coach Jeff Smock decided to make a decision at offensive coordinator.

“He (Smock) let me know that we were going to make a change at offensive coordinator,” said Coach William Hiatt in a video released by Smock.

According to Hiatt, in the video released by Smock, he was given the opportunity to stay on staff in a different role but decided to step away. Hiatt will still be here in the building as a science teacher, as well as a track and field coach.

“He gave me the opportunity to stick around on staff… and I just don’t think that is right for me and my family at this point,” said Hiatt.

Taking over this role of offensive coordinator is a man from North Central High School, Coach Mark Brown. According to his twitter account, @Coach_MarkBrown, he was an “Associate HC/OC/OL Coach” at North Central High School. He first visited with players here at Lebanon on January 30th.

Prior to coming to Lebanon, Coach Brown started his career at Earlham College in 2007 as a graduate assistant going 3-7.

He then went on to coach at 1A Lafayette Central Catholic from 2008-2014, going 89-6 and winning 4 state titles.

Then he moved to 1A Carroll Flora from 2014-2017, going 24-20. ‘

And then most recently he was at 6A North Central High School as the Offensive Coordinator, going 25-37, against some very tough competition like Hamilton Southeastern, Center Grove, Carmel, and Ben Davis.

This makes Coach Brown 138-53 as a high school football coach with 4-state titles.

*all of the above records are according to MaxPreps*

Looking at this you see that Coach Brown has quite the resume. The team was able to speak with him and Junior Sam Kyker asked what his goal was, he said “My goal is to go undefeated!” With this in mind, it seems like Coach Brown would like to add another state title to his resume this year.

Do the Tigers have what it takes? To snag a state title the Tigers will have to soar through some of Indiana’s great football teams, like Roncalli, Mooresville, and Brebuf. And this is just sectional. Once the tigers compete with these tough teams in sectional, they will then have to take on more great teams, like New Praire, East Central, and New Palestine.

What is something the Tigers must improve on to win state?

Well, I asked 5^th year Defensive Coordinator Coach Joshua DeBard. He said “discipline, being coachable, and love for the team, game, and coaches.”

Coach Brown would like to try to get a job at LHS. Currently, he is teaching social studies at North Central.