A long-time member of the Parkview High School football community is coming home.
The school is set to hire Loganville’s Eric Godfree, a former player and member of its last state championship staff, as head football coach, pending approval from the school board next month.
Godfree succeeds his former coach, Cecil Flowe, who retired from public schools in December and later took a job as defensive coordinator at King’s Ridge in Alpharetta.
“I love the Parkview community, the tradition in athletics, not just football, but in all sports,’’ Godfree said. “That’s a big draw. I’m going home.’’
Godfree played on Flowe’s first two Parkview teams in 1993 and 1994. The 1994 team was the first to win a playoff game in school history, which dates to 1976. Parkview won four state titles during the ensuing 10 seasons. Godfree coached on the 2000, 2001 and 2002 championship teams that were part of a state-record 46-game winning streak.
Parkview has been a middling program for the past eight seasons. The Panthers were 9-4 in 2012, winning their first playoff game since 2005, but slipped to 3-7 in 2013.
“It still has great potential,’’ Godfree said. “Obviously in the glory years, that doesn’t happen often in any program. It’s a rare find. To say we’re going to win three state championships in a row again, realistically, no. But is there still potential to win state titles? Yes. They’ve still got good athletes, good team speed and a good coaching staff.’’
Godfree said that he probably would retain many, if not most, of the current members of the Parkview staff but hoped to hire two or three new coaches, perhaps some from his Loganville staff. Godfree said to expect more changes on offense than defense. Godfree was the quarterbacks coach in Loganville’s spread offense and called the plays.
“I love calling plays on Friday nights,’’ Godfree said. “That gets me excited. We’re going to be a more up-tempo, faster paced, Auburn-Oregon style, which is fun for the kids. It’s something I learned from Bruce Miller at Gainesville. Practice can be fun.’’
Godfree has been Loganville’s coach the past 10 seasons. His record was 53-50 at a program with modest talent. Loganville had only two major Division I college signees in Godfree’s 10 seasons. Loganville won a region championship in 2008 and cost eventual state champion Gainesville a region title in 2012 with a stunning 46-41 upset.
“He’s a really good coach,’’ Loganville offensive coordinator Nick Johnson said. “We’re about to find out how good he is. He’s going to win there.’’
Godfree told his Loganville players of the impending move Monday. He will begin work at Parkview next week, but officially cannot be approved as head coach until later next month.
