By Duane Cochran
FAIRMONT — When Jason Woodman graduated from North Marion High School in the spring of 1997 and headed off to play college baseball at Alderson-Broaddus the idea of someday becoming a college football coach as his profession was probably one of the furthest things from his mind.
Isn’t it funny, though, how time can change things.
After a few seasons of playing baseball at A-B, Woodman elected to transfer to Fairmont State and finish work there on his undergraduate degree. Right around that same time the urge to coach football struck Woodman.
“I think it was something that was ingrained in me from a young age,” he said. “I remember being young and watching the (Pittsburgh) Steelers and (Dallas) Cowboys play with my uncles and I remember the passion they had for those games. My one uncle (Mark Angelucci) played for North Marion in the late 1980s when they had some tough teams and just learning and knowing all of the great history of that program and having the chance to play there myself – it was special. It was pretty appealing to me.”
Thus, Woodman asked his former coach Gerry White for the opportunity to be a volunteer coach for the Huskies and in a few years worked his way up through the ranks to become the head coach of North Marion’s freshman team.
At the time that was all well and good for the youngster, but a desire to achieve more burned inside of Woodman.
Before the start of the 2004 college football season White, whose ex-brother-in-law is Nick Saban, arranged for Woodman to head off to Louisiana State University and join the Tigers’ football program as an intern.
“At first I was a bit shell-shocked to be quite honest,” said Woodman. “I went from breaking down film on Fairmont Senior to breaking down film on Auburn. That was quite an experience for me.
“Coach Saban from every angle of football is one of the smartest individuals I’ll ever have the chance to be around and Jimbo (Fisher) offensively is very intelligent as well. To have the chance to work with him and learn from him was invaluable to me. It was an opportunity, to be honest, I never dreamed I’d have.”
Woodman spent three seasons at LSU before leaving with Fisher in 2007 to become a graduate assistant under Bobby Bowden at Florida State.
“I got lucky again,” said Woodman with a laugh. “That too was another great learning experience for me.
“Being a G.A. you’re busy from the time you get in the office until the time you leave and sometimes you kind of get lost in the moment and forget where you are. I remember the first time I met Charlie Ward (Florida State’s 1993 Heisman Trophy winning quarterback). I had to look twice at him. I said to myself, ‘That’s Charlie Ward.’ It was like I forgot where I was for a minute.”
In 2008 Woodman joined John Luckhardt’s staff at California (Pa.) University as the running backs coach under then-offensive coordinator Mike Kellar. When Kellar left Cal last December to take his first head coaching job at Concord University he took Woodman with him and made him the Mountain Lions’ receivers and special teams coach.
“The biggest thing Woody brought to the table was the fact that he understood the system I wanted to run and he has a great background in coaching from all of the outstanding programs he’s been involved with,” said Kellar. “He spent time at LSU with Jimbo Fisher and also at Florida State with him and you know I kind of cut my teeth my teeth under Jimbo as well. He was my first quarterback coach at Glenville under coach Rod (Rich Rodriguez). A lot of those offensive philosophies were born back in those days at Glenville and Woody knows them inside and out.
“He came to Cal and did a great job for us. He’s a guy I feel I can trust and lean on and when I had a chance to hire him I didn’t hesitate.”
The ever-thankful Woodman, who is now 30 years old, knows he’s been blessed in recent years and says he’s really enjoying the task that he and Kellar have undertaken together at Concord.
“I’m in a good place. I know that,” said Woodman. “I’m thankful everyday. We’re trying to build something at Concord. We’ve taken some big steps this fall, but at the same time both Mike and I know we’ve still got a lot of work ahead of us and a long way to go to get our program where we want it to be.”
