Boone promotes Charles Sprenkel to take over as head football coach

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After a vast search for its next football coach, the Boone High administration decided to remain in house, announcing Monday it has promoted assistant coach Charles Sprenkel to take over for Andy Johnson, who resigned in January.

Sprenkel, who was an offensive lineman during his playing career at Delray Atlantic High and UCF, has been coaching at Boone for the past four seasons, tending to the defensive line for the past two. He said he will retain Charles Nassar as his defensive coordinator, as well as assistant coach Chris Isaacs, and he will also keep a few other staffers, but the offensive coordinator position is still undetermined.

“It’s a relief. The process is pretty long but it’s nice to know that I have the support of the administration and the community and, most importantly, the fellow coaches and players on the team,” Sprenkel said. “It’s kind of nice knowing how things operate here and how things have been done recently. … what’s worked and what hasn’t worked.”

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It’s the first head coaching job position Sprenkel, who is 31. He also spent four seasons as an assistant coach at East River.

“I’ve always told people that if I become a head coach I would like to make this type of in-house move as my first opportunity rather than taking over a program that I didn’t know anything about,” Sprenkel said. “I can kind of slide into that slot already knowing the kids. You know the community, you know the tradition of the school and how things run and operate … a seamless transition.”

As with any change in a coaching staff, there will be differences, but those changes remain to be seen. Sprenkel will be only the third head coach at Boone over the past 36 years as he follows Johnson and Phil Ziglar, who passed away last month.

“When we talked about it in the interview, I told them, ‘You can’t expect Andy Johnson 2.0 or Phil Ziglar 2.0,’ ” Sprenkel said. “There will be some changes as there is with any staff change like this, but there’s gonna be some things that we still do that have kind of been established. We’ll keep some of the old tradition but kinda put our own little flavor to certain things.”

He’s an offensive mind, having played to O-line, so that’s how he thinks.

“I played 16 consecutive seasons of tackle football and pretty much spent every one of them playing offensive line, so I pretty much identify with the offense,” Sprenkel said.

Sprenkel went to UCF as a preferred walk-on out of Atlantic High, so he knows the rigors of working his way up the ladder from a scout-team player to a full-scholarship roster member. He also had the unique experience of playing for an 0-12 team at UCF in 2015, as well as the 13-0 Peach Bowl champions in 2017.

“I’ve never been afraid to work hard and roll up my sleeves and put my nose to the grindstone,” Sprenkel said. “As a walk-on I really had to grind it out and bust my tail to prove to the coaches that I deserved to be there and belong on the team.”

And it certainly wasn’t easy, running scout team and then doing all of the other grunt work that is associated with being a walk-on player.

“It was rough, I’ll admit. Being a walk-on, especially in a program like Coach O’Leary’s, you’re earning everything. It’s a grind,” Sprenkel said. “There were days when you walked into the building and you’re like, ‘I don’t know if I can do this?’ There are days when everything you are doing is tested and you really have to love the game and love that grind.”

He played for George O’Leary initially at UCF, and then in stepped Scott Frost, so he knows a bit about coaching transition.

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“After three years, Coach O’Leary retired and Scott Frost took over and he brought in some new stuff and he kept some stuff the same,” Sprenkel said. “People always ask me, ‘What was so different about it?’ Well, there are always some changes you’re gonna like and some you don’t.

“So here, in my case, there are gonna be some changes people are not gonna like too much … and there will be changes that people will love. You’re not gonna be able to please everybody, but I think as long as you keep with the tradition and the core values of Boone High School we’ll create an exciting product.”

Having O’Leary and Frost as college coaches gave Sprenkel quite a spectrum of philosophies in leadership.

“You talk about polar opposites,” Sprenkel said. “Coach O’Leary was very old-school and he had us practicing at 3 p.m. in August when it’s 100 degrees outside, and Scott Frost was a little bit more of that new-age players coach, if you will. … It was kind of neat to play for both of them.”

He’s one of the youngest coaches in Central Florida, but that doesn’t faze him.

“I’ve been around a lot of ball and a lot environments, playing for George and playing for Scott and those types of men,” Sprenkel said. “There are not many offenses I wasn’t a part of and not many defenses I haven’t seen. I’m not saying I know it all, but I’ve been part of a team for 24-25 years.

“The guys on the O-line and D-line that I’ve coached the last few years were some hard-hat, lunch-pail guys and that’s a mentality I hope to instill in this entire team.”

Chris Hays can be found on X.com@OS_ChrisHays.

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