A group of parents urged the Ellwood City Area School District’s Board of Directors to consider naming a new head coach for the football program.
The parents place the blame for three seasons in a row with a losing streak to current head coach Joe Lamenza.
The main complaint expressed was a lack of inspiration and encouragement. The parents claim that the environment of losing has had a severe impact on the mental health of the players and that it is preventing future generations of players from wanting to play.
Lamenza, a 1996 graduate of Lincoln High School, was named the head coach of the Wolverines in 2018 following the stepping down of Nick Hand.
Lamenza was an assistant coach at Robert Morris then he became head coach at West Mifflin in 2006. The Titans finished 3-6 is his only season there. In 2011, Lamenza became head coach at Mohawk. His record there was 7-29. Following his tenure at Mohawk, Lamenza took over the head coaching position at Blackhawk with a record of 8-19.
Previous to Lamenza taking over, Ellwood City had 3-7 overall and tied for sixth in the eight-team Class 2A Midwestern Athletic Conference. The team hasn’t qualified for the WPIAL playoffs since 2011.
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i watched almost every game this yr on youtube. ellwood was so outsized in every game but they had so many freshman and sophs playing.
As a “outsider” who just moved to Ellwood 7 years ago I really have no skin in this game and can only go on statistics. Coach Lamenza came to Ellwood with a Head Coaching record of 18-79 combined with West Mifflin, Mohawk and Blackhawk. In the previous 3 seasons at Ellwood his record is 0-26. It’s my belief that what truly initiates a Change in Coaching is that Team has only scored 160 points over the last 3 years while giving up 967 points. As children, they can only take so many drubbings before their syce says it’s not worth it, no matter who or what their Coach says. Maybe it’s just me Coach, but how about giving them a change in Direction.
Has moving out of the WPIAL for football, like Butler did when they experienced lack of success over and over, ever come up for consideration? Or playing an independent schedule like Uniontown and Albert Gallatin? At some point something like these ideas need to be explored. also, I’ve also seen youtube videos of the EC middle school football team over the past 4-5 years. They rarely lose and are usually more talented than their opponents. I don’t see the correlation here.