Valdosta promoted defensive coordinator Alan Rodemaker to head football coach on Monday night, the Valdosta Daily Times reported.
Rodemaker had been Valdosta’s defensive coordinator the past six seasons under Rance Gillespie, who resigned last month to become co-offensive coordinator at Georgia Southern University. Rodemaker had been named interim head coach and was supported by players at Monday’s school board meeting to approve his hiring, according to the newspaper.
Rodemaker has been a Georgia head coach one other time, in 1999 and 2000 at Peach County, where his teams were 15-8. Coincidentally, he was replaced at Peach by Gillespie.
Meanwhile, Rodemaker got out of coaching and worked in the private sector in his native North Carolina for eight years until Gillespie talked him back on the sidelines at Valdosta in 2010. Gillespie and Rodemaker had been on staffs together at Thomasville and Peach and had kept in contact throughout Rodemaker’s years out of coaching.
Valdosta was 49-20 in Gillespie's six seasons, 8-4 in 2015.
Rodemaker will be Valdosta's eighth head coach since 1946.
