In the midst of a downturn for its football program in recent years, and a league championship drought that now spans nearly three decades, St. John's Jesuit has tabbed an enthusiastic Joe Horn as the man who will guide the Titans upward in the coming seasons.
“This is a dream come true for me,” Horn said immediately upon being introduced at a media gathering at the school. “The reason why is that I just think St. John's is a perfect fit for me personally. This is a place that felt like home from the minute I stepped in the building here.
“It was a great experience for me all around. My wife Aly, and my little son Joey, we're excited to be Titans and couldn't be anymore thrilled to be here.”
Horn, 37, is a football guy to the core as a fourth-generation coach. After multiple assistant coaching positions at the college level, he spent the past two years serving as Anthony Wayne's offensive coordinator under highly-successful Generals head coach Andy Brungard.
In those two years, AW went 22-4 overall, won two Northern Lakes League Buckeye Division titles, and advanced to the third round of the Division II playoffs each season.
Although this was just part of Anthony Wayne's recent winning tradition under Brungard (nine seasons, 87-21 record, 53-6 NLL, nine playoffs, six league titles), the Generals' top man gives his outgoing OC a major endorsement.
“Joe and I have been friends for 17 years,” Brungard said. “We first coached together in Perrysburg 17 years ago. We’ve always supported each other and grown as coaches on our own journeys. To have him here the last two years has been a lot of work that we put in together to be successful, and it was a blast.
“I have a ton of respect for Joe. He is great with overall scheme, and working with kids to foster a love and excitement for high school football. He will be great for St. John's, and the game of football in northwest Ohio.”
To the Titans' search committee, which was seeking a successor for former head coach Larry McDaniel (eight seasons, 40-43 record, 7 playoff appearances), it was Horn's upbeat personality, attention to detail, and a focus on relationship building – along with a strong coaching resume – that ultimately won their support.
“With some of the coaches we had reached out to, seeing if they had an interest, his name kept popping up,” St. John's athletic director Bob Ronai said of Horn. “So, we kind of went into the back channels, and [former Titans head coach] Doug Pearson talked to coach Brungard over at Anthony Wayne.
“[Brungard] said, 'He would be a great hire. You ought to bring him in for an interview.' We reached out to Joe, and he said, 'Yes, I'm really interested. Can you wait 'til the season is over?' We brought him in.
“We had a bunch of good candidates, and we were really pleased with the final two. But, Joe's last day going around school was really outstanding, and we felt he was the perfect fit for what we want.”
St. John's, which has a strong athletic tradition in numerous sports – most notably basketball at the state level, along with soccer, track, baseball, hockey, cross country, tennis, golf, and lacrosse, which have all contended for, or won, state titles – has been good but not great in its football history.
The Titans, winners of eight City League championships between 1976-1996, have not won another league crown since then. St. John's has gone 147-119 overall since 2000, with 13 postseason appearances, highlighted by a 10-4 season in 2003, when Pearson's Titans reached the Division I state semifinals.
In the past 15 years, they are an even .500 at 78-78 overall. After going 4-2 in the pandemic-abbreviated 2020 season, St. John's has posted records of 5-6, 5-6, 4-7, and a program-worst 1-9 this past season. Their Week-10 42-0 shutout of University of Detroit-Jesuit thwarted a potential winless season.
“Obviously, the [CHSL] is very tough,” Ronai said of the Michigan-based league Toledo's three Catholic-school football teams (with Central Catholic and St. Francis de Sales) joined in 2023. “It's the [former] TRAC on steroids. But, we feel like we've had games the past couple years that were winnable games.
“Right away, with the enthusiasm and everything [Horn is] going to bring to the program, those games should happen for us. I think he'll take us to the next level. He doesn't have to rebuild everything.
“Coach [Larry] McDaniel took it to a certain point, and now we've obviously got to go to another point. It seems like COVID really hit us, and we haven't really recovered since the pre-COVID world.”
Horn was selective in pursuit of his first head-coaching post.
“There's not a lot of head coaching jobs that I was really interested in,” he said. “I was really happy at Anthony Wayne with coach [Andy] Brungard. They've got great program there.
“When the St. John's job came open, and I had the opportunity to apply for it, it became very quickly apparent to me that this place is a place where you could win at a high level, pursue [league] championships, and contend for a state championship. I think there's a lot of places in Ohio where that's not the case – where five or six wins is the top of the line.”
Horn acknowledges climbing from 1-9 to chasing league titles and deep playoff runs won't be easy, and will take time.
“Just having me here isn't going to change anything,” he said. “What allows you to pursue those championships is more than just a coach. We've got to have the resources, we've got to have the leadership in place, we've got to have a community of people who believe in what we're doing, and supports us every step of the way.
“There's no doubt that the St. John's Jesuit community is that. That, as a whole, is what is really exciting about this place. They have a history if success, and I'm excited to get the culture changed. Excited to move forward and teach football the way that I believe it's supposed to be played.
“But, in the end, our goal is to be able to compete for those conference championships and contend for those state titles.”
Horn's plan has been shaped by a lifetime of football in his family. His great grandfather was a head football coach in the 1930s at the former Youngstown Rayen High School. His grandfather (Joe Horn) and father (Jay Horn) were both head coaches at Joe's alma mater, Waynesfield-Goshen High School.
“Our football program's going to be built on effort,” Horn said. “We want guys who want to play football with a tremendous amount of tenacity, and with a ton of energy. We, first and foremost, want to start at that standpoint.
“We believe wins and losses are going to take care of themselves. It's easy to say that standing up here, but that truly is the case. There are no shortcuts when it comes to building a championship football program.”
First Published December 12, 2024, 12:57 a.m.
