Gaddis will be Oak Ridge coach for Rang suspension
Retired Oak Ridge football coach Joe Gaddis will return to the sideline as the team’s head coach for Friday’s game against Clinton.
Gaddis, now the Oak Ridge athletic director, will replace coach Derek Rang, the first-year coach, for one game. Rang was suspended for the Week 6 contest after being ejected in last week’s 14-3 loss at McMinn County due to repeated sideline interference calls, according to a TSSAA officials report obtained by Knox News.
Rang was handed four sideline interference calls in the game: one in the first and second quarters and two in the third quarter. After the fourth penalty with 6:33 left in the third period, Rang was ejected.
“He honestly didn’t do anything,” Gaddis told Knox News. “No matter what coaches on the staff actually cause the infraction, the head coach gets assigned the penalties.”
Gaddis did not volunteer to replace Rang as coach against Clinton. Rang asked him to fill in a day after the loss to McMinn County. Gaddis said Rang wanted his assistant coaches to keep their normal responsibilities and did not want to “add the head coach pressures or burdens” on them.
If this wasn’t Rang’s request, Gaddis would not be coaching again.
“That’s not something I want to do,” Gaddis said. “If I wanted to keep coaching, I would have not retired a couple years ago. But (Rang) thinks it’s the best thing for the game and for the program. So since he thinks that way, I’ll do it this one time.”
Gaddis has not been involved in the gameplan and will not be calling specific plays. He said he’ll be responsible for calling timeouts and making other “hiccup decisions” such as going for it on significant fourth-downs, choosing to take an extra point or attempt a two-point conversion, etc.
Oak Ridge (3-1, 1-0 Region 3-5A) will play its second region game of the season against Clinton (2-3, 1-0), which Gaddis said “has the best team they’ve had in years.” He said that he is looking forward to the crucial game and that this position is not anything new for him as he has 38 years of high school football coaching experience.
Gaddis first coached Oak Ridge from 1988-98 and was rehired in 2013 and retired in 2021. In his two stints leading the Wildcats, he has a 196-58 overall record. He has a state championship from 1991 and a state runner-up finish in 2020.