FORTWALTON BEACH — To nobody’s surprise, the Okaloosa County School Board approved Tim Hatten as the Crestview High School athletic director and head football coach on Monday.
A press conference introducing Hatten is at 2:30 p.m.Wednesday in the school’s media center.
Hatten, who comes to Crestview from Pearl River Community College in Mississippi, accepted the job last week and started at Crestview on Tuesday.
“Any time you start anything new, you’ve got to be excited, whether you are 23 or 49,” Hatten said. “I’m ready to go, to evaluate talent and to look at all the sports at Crestview High School and see if there is any kind of way that I can make a difference and help out in any facet.
“The evaluation process is certainly where we will start with the job, not only as the athletic director, but the head football coach as well so I’m excited about it.”
Crestview principal Bob Jones welcomed Hatten to Bulldog Country.
“We are excited about coach Hatten,” he said. “When I first saw the applicants and looked at their resumes, he was in my top three right off the bat because of his career and what he has done. He has only been at two places and he has won at the high school level and the college level.
“The biggest thing for me was when I saw that at the community college he had sent over 100 players to Division I football. He knows how to get his players to the next level, and that’s very big with us and I’m real happy about that.”
Hatten, who played football at Pearl River, said that after 11 years it was simply time for a change.
“I had 11 great years there,” he said. “I actually played football at Pearl River and it’s a great place. We put up a lot of great years and put up a lot of great memories there.
“But there comes a time where you have to attack some different challenges. Everything we were going to accomplish would have been a repeat and here there is a lot of newness. With newness comes excitement and enthusiasm, and I can’t wait to get started.”
Randy Dickson is the Crestview News Bulletin’s sports editor. Email him at randyd@crestviewbulletin.com, tweet him @BigRandle, or call 682-6524
This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: Board OKs Hatten as Crestview AD/head football coach