Editor’s note: As part of a 10-day project, the Star is looking back at the 2019 season, and — starting today — asking five big questions about the fall. Today’s question: Who will be Mica Mountain High School’s first coach?
When it comes to starting traditions and forming a culture, this isn’t Nemer Hassey’s first rodeo.
Hassey established himself as one of the top high school football coaches in Southern Arizona after a successful run at Sahuaro that resulted in a state championship appearance. Hassey moved to the newly formed Cienega High School in 2001, where he was put in charge of the football program. Hassey left a program he took to a state title game to gamble on the shiny new school in Vail.
Nearly two decades and multiple playoff runs later, including a spot in the 2011 state championship, Cienega has become a brand name on the Arizona high school football scene.
Hassey will try to do it again, albeit from a different position, starting this fall. Hassey is principal of the new Mica Mountain High School, located in the Vail School District.
Brett Darling, the former defensive coordinator at Cienega, has been tasked with starting up the program.
“The one thing Nemer has done — that I try to emulate — is come up with a clear message that you repeat over and over again, so when that message is defied, the kids know it without you saying a word,” said Darling.
There’s a twist: Darling, who will also assume a leadership role in Mica Mountain’s social studies department, won’t actually serve as the varsity head coach.
Mica Mountain, which is still under construction, will have just 500 students starting this fall. The Thunderbolts plan to play at the junior varsity level for two years with Darling in charge before jumping up to varsity. By then, enrollment is expected to top 2,000 students.
Hassey plans to name a varsity coach at the end of the 2020 season. Darling will serve as the defensive coordinator under whomever is chosen.
“I have a short list, and it’ll be a relevant coach,” Hassey said.
Mica Mountain’s football program wasn’t what sold Darling on a move from Cienega to Vail’s expansion high school anyway.
“Being a defensive coordinator doesn’t pay the bills; teaching does,” Darling said. “I’ve worked with several principals, and Nemer is by far the best leader I’ve ever been around — and I can tell you thousands of stories why. He’s by far the best leader I’ve ever been around — in times of crisis and in times of good.”
Mica Mountain will add another high school to Vail’s ever-increasing population. Hassey had his hands on Mica Mountain’s construction; he took certain elements from other schools, including Cienega, and implemented them into the layout of Southern Arizona’s new high school.
To help with developing the school’s identity, Mica Mountain had a 200-member committee that was broken into sub-committees, which Hassey said “has been a great process.”
“That’s how the school got designed,” he said. “We took input from the community and one of those categories was the naming of the school, mascot and school colors. … Most of the schools are named after something in our district. Mica is the highest point of the (Rincon Mountains).
“If you look at the front of our school, you can actually see Mica Mountain.”
Mica Mountain flirted with using Rattlers as the mascot with purple, black and silver as the school colors before opting for Thunderbolts and a black, powder blue and silver scheme.
Why Thunderbolts? Mica Mountain’s mascot honors the A-10 Thunderbolt jets at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, along with Tucson’s monsoon season during the summer.
Four different treatments of the Mica Mountain Thunderbolts' logo.
Hassey will have a longtime foe as his partner during the process. In January, former Sabino football coach Jay Campos was hired to be Mica Mountain’s assistant principal. After 11 years of coaching against each other and combining for a 274-85 (.763) record, Campos and Hassey are teaming up. Campos announced earlier this month that former Sabino boys basketball coach and former Salpointe Catholic girls volleyball coach Amy Johnson will join Mica Mountain’s staff.
“(Campos) can run the athletics side of things and then I can do what I need to do as principal, and he can do that really well, and that’s why I’m feeling good about him, because he can take that on, the school safety,” Hassey said. “He’s a leader and a go-getter. He’s organized and a hard worker, and I think we’re going to be a really good team. In a couple years, hopefully we add another assistant principal to compliment us.”
The goal for right now is to replicate the culture of Cienega or Sabino, and have the groundwork for Tucson’s next possible football powerhouse, and Darling will be the X-factor during this process.
“You’re establishing culture, tradition and ‘This is how we do things.’ … I get to be a part of establishing that, so I made a teaching decision to help start a high school,” Darling said. “We’re not going to have Friday night lights in a year — maybe two years. Therefore, this is not all-or-nothing. We’re all in this together and this is a slow process, so hopefully this comes out in three years with us having a successful season at the varsity level.”
