Allen hires Lloyd as head coach

posted on January 30th, 2010 by Dean

By Keith Groller (The Morning Call):

Cedric Lloyd, a coach who has experience in trying to revive a struggling inner-city football program in  Indianapolis, was unanimously approved by the Allentown School District Thursday night as the new head football coach at Allen High School.

Lloyd becomes the first African-American coach in Allentown/Allen’s long football history.

”He’s got the energy, the enthusiasm, the personality, the experience we wanted in our next football coach; he’s the perfect fit,” said Allen principal Keith Falko Thursday night after announcing Lloyd’s name on a local cable television show. ”We had an overwhelming response to our search and had a number of excellent candidates apply. It was a very tough decision, but with Coach Lloyd’s experience and background as a head coach at an urban school very similar to ours, we feel he is the guy best-suited to lead our program.”

Lloyd will succeed Chris Kinane, who was 1-19 in two seasons. Allen defeated Dieruff in the final game of the 2009 season to end a 29-game losing streak that included winless 2007 and 2008 seasons.

The new coach will be used to tough situations because he was the head coach at Manual High School in Indianapolis, a program that hasn’t had a winning record since 1987, and a school that has a lot of the same problems that are prevalent in Allentown.

Lloyd coached the last two seasons at Manual, going 2-18. The team, competing against private and suburban schools with much larger rosters, was 0-10 last season and outscored 465-99.

Manual High, a Class 4A school with approximately 1,000 students (there are five classifications in Indiana) had just a 39 percent graduation rate. Lloyd had just 17 kids on the varsity roster by the end of last season, and in November it was announced that the program would be a victim of budget cuts.

In a story last fall in the Indianapolis Star, the 40-year-old Lloyd was described in very positive tones.

”The second-year coach is a boyish-looking 1987 Tech High School graduate with three children,” Matthew Tully wrote last October. ”He believes in football. In its deeper meanings. In the life lessons it offers. Lessons about teamwork and discipline, about structure and consistency. He talks often about character and sacrifice and community. Last summer, he made his players spend day after day cleaning the streets and sidewalks in the area bordering Manual so they would connect with the neighborhood.

”In a school with a high dropout rate, he’s had to rely mainly on underclassmen. He’s thinking long-term, working with a feeder middle school’s football program in the hope of building his own program in the coming years.”

Lloyd will be formally introduced to the media and the Allen High staff today.

Leave a Reply

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website