Westfield names Watson as new football head coach

There will be a rebuilding situation at Westfield in the 2016 football season.

But the transition to a new head coach after nearly two dozen years is likely to be minimal.

Longtime assistant coach Jamey Watson was named on Thursday to succeed Ronnie Jones, who announced his retirement in December after leading the Hornets for 23 seasons.

Only a few of those seasons didn't include the 42-year-old Watson.

Athletics director Chip Champion said the school received a little more than 30 applications and interviewed three finalists.

"We had some really good applicants," he said. "We had a pretty good mixture, and to be honest, we had several good candidates in-house."

Assistant coaches Rhett Farmer and Ken Fowler have been head coaches, Farmer at Piedmont where he won two Class AA state titles and Fowler at Fullington.

One reason for the delay in finalizing the hire was Champion's other job, as girls basketball head coach. The Hornets made the GISA Class AAA semifinals, so his season ended only last week.

"More than anything was his familiarity with the program," Champion said. "He's a Westfield guy. We just felt like the success we had in the program and everything we had going, we want to continue that as much as we can."

Watson graduated from Westfield in 1991, returning to Westfield after graduating from Georgia Southwestern State.

He became defensive coordinator in his second year at Westfield, and he held that title until he took the 2015 season off to spend time with his family. But after discussing the opening with his family, he went for it and got it.

"It was kind of tough to hand over the reins," Watson said. "But they did a great job. There's a great staff there."

Watson expects that staff to remain intact.

"With our staff, you felt comfortable, and a lot of that is due to Coach Jones, them learning from him and it being as stable as it has been over the years," Champion said. "(Watson) is going to have to put his own touches on the program. I'm sure he's going to carry over a lot of the tradition and stuff that's made us as successful as we've been."

Along those lines, don't expect much different from what led Westfield to go 217-68-3 under Jones.

"I'm definitely from the Ronnie Jones school of thinking," Watson said. "We're definitely of the mind if it's not broke, don't fix it. There'll be some changes, but Ronnie has done a great job of setting a precedent and getting a system in place we feel like is effective.

"I don't think you're going to see us get away from it very much."

This story was originally published March 10, 2016 at 7:40 PM with the headline "Westfield names Watson as new football head coach ."