Recharged McFarlin back on Roswell sidelines

Tim McFarlin’s wife says her husband needed his batteries recharged.

Two years later, the man who stepped down as Ros-well’s head football coach at age 50 — a season after winning a state title — is back on Roswell’s staff, juices flowing.

McFarlin is the new quarterbacks coach for Leo Barker, the man promoted to replace McFarlin as Ros-well’s head coach in 2008.

Wife Kay was back in the stands Friday night at Peachtree Ridge, doing what she’s done for most of her fall Friday nights for the past 30 years — watching Roswell football.

“The last couple of years he was head coach, I don’t think people realize the time commitment involved,” Kay said. “His day often started at 6:30 [a.m.], and he’d be plugged in until 11:30 at night. He was physically worn out. He was hospitalized a couple of times due to dehydration. He knew he needed a sabbatical.”

But she knew he’d be back.

Peachtree Ridge, Ros-well’s opponent Friday, happened to be the school with which Roswell tied in the Class AAAAA championship game in 2006. Several months after that, McFarlin’s soul-searching began.

“Here we are, winning a share of a state championship, and the next year ranked nationally and No. 1 in the state, and I looked at it, and honestly, it wasn’t a lot of fun,” McFarlin said. “There was something missing.”

Simply put, he missed the kind of coaching he’s doing now — hands on.

Unlike Barker, who runs Roswell’s defense, McFarlin was not an offensive or defensive coordinator while head coach. He had become more of an administrator.

McFarlin, who came to Roswell in 1981 and was head coach for 10 years, was helping raise about $70,000 a year to remain competitive among the state’s elite programs. He headed up Roswell’s fundraising for new artificial turf and a matrix scoreboard. Largely due to McFarlin, Roswell became the first Fulton County school to get those amenities.

Now, McFarlin’s job is simpler, and he relishes it.

During the first year of his recharge, McFarlin didn’t coach at all. He went to college games featuring some of his former players. In 2009, he was hired as director of football at King’s Ridge Christian Academy, a small private school in Alpharetta, and started its varsity program but continued to teach at Roswell.

In February, Barker was looking to replace a couple of coaches. He found one down the hallway.

At most schools, that would be odd, but it has precedent at Roswell.

In 2000, Ray Manus — the former Roswell head coach whom McFarlin considers his mentor — came back to be McFarlin’s quarterbacks coach for eight years.

Barker doesn’t look over his shoulder. This is a close-knit staff that includes three Roswell graduates.