Interview: Chalmette’s Tucker high on new backfield, team’s 2020 chances

To say that Chalmette High School is home for Jason Tucker would be an understatement.

After attending school at Chalmette, graduating in 1993, Tucker returned to his alma mater and is entering his 14th season as head coach of the Owls in 2020.

Tucker has led his Owls to the playoffs the last five seasons with winning records in each season and also guided Chalmette to the playoffs in 2010.

While Chalmette has experienced the postseason frequently of late, the last playoff win for the Owls was in 2004, as a member of Class 3A.

Speaking on All Access on 106.1 FM Wednesday night, Tucker, who understands St. Bernard Parish as well as anyone, could only harken back to 2005 when watching the catastrophic effects of Hurricane Laura on southwest Louisiana and Hurricane Sally on the eastern portion of the Gulf Coast.

“There was so much devastation with Katrina with our parish,” Tucker said. “I’ve lived there all my life. We had water everywhere through it. I know what they are going through.”

Tucker feels his team will once again contend to make the playoffs in 2020.

“I think so,” Tucker said. “We have a lot of guys to replace. We lost our entire backfield. Anytime you do that, I think it’s a challenge for everyone. Our coaches, we’ve been here a long time. We’ve been here together so I think that’s really going to help us to move forward with these young guys we have.

While the staff is largely intact, there was one key departure following last season.

“We did lose our offensive coordinator, Kyle Walker to Riverdale (as head coach),” Tucker said. “That’s a huge loss for us. He guided the offense last year that scored the most points in Chalmette history. Replacing him is going to be a challenge.”

With the regular season reduced to eight games, Chalmette starts the season with a loud bang, against perhaps its most heated and significant rival.

“We start off with Coach Salt (Nick Saltaformaggio) and Holy Cross,” Tucker said. “I’m glad we get to keep the rivalry going, that we don’t miss this one with everything going on.

It’s big, especially for guys like myself who came up as a young kid coming to watch the game and actually playing in the game and then actually coaching the game. That week’s always a little special to me. I get a lot of phone calls from both sides. It’s a fun atmosphere. We always look forward to it.”

Saltaformaggio preceded Tucker as the head coach at Chalmette.

The Owls came within a point of winning District 8-5A a year ago, losing 35-34 to John Ehret.

“Ehret has been the hump that we have to get over,” Tucker said. “We had them in a situation last year where we wound up going to overtime and we decided to go for two for the win. All my coaches were in my headset. Everybody was on board. We liked the play we had. It just didn’t work out.”

Tucker sees one unusual circumstance in the league this year with Grace King, Riverdale, Higgins and West Jefferson.

“I do think what’s interesting in our district is that there are so many new coaches,” Tucker said. “There’s only three returning coaches in myself, Frank Allelo at East Jefferson and Brett Bonnaffons at Bonnabel. Everyone else is new so it’s a challenge just to see what they’re going to do, the stuff they’re going to run, what to expect.”

Tucker talked about the new look backfield Chalmette will employ this season.

“We have Kirk Dusang (quarterback) who got some valuable time last year,” Tucker said. “He’s going into his junior year. We have an incoming freshman that we also like in Greg Donaldson. They are both going to have opportunities to do different things for us. We come back with Emmanuel Williams at running back. We’re excited to have him back. He can go the distance, at times.”

Where the Owls should be good is up front.

“We come back with four starters on the offensive line,” Tucker said. “One of them is our tight end, who we definitely look at as a college prospect. Gavin Burtchaell (6-5, 250) is big and he’s in the high 4.8 range in the 40-yard dash. We’ll try to get him the ball in the passing game. He’s a big target for us. We also have junior Teryan Nelson, who’s one of our returning receivers who can stretch the defense for us.”

Despite the tough offseason, Tucker says his players kept the faith.

“We never stopped believing that we were going to play,” Tucker said. “We kept the focus on its coming. I really believed that we were going to play. It helped the morale when they came out and said we would play.”

The Owls will travel to Northshore to scrimmage on Sept. 24 before opening with Holy Cross. Fortunately, Chalmette has not had any real distraction from the coronavirus.

“We really haven’t had any type of major outbreak,” Tucker said. “We’ve been keeping our distance, we’ve been sanitizing, everything. Coaches have masks on. We’ve been doing everything that they’ve asked us to do. We really haven’t had any problems. We follow whatever rules they put out. It doesn’t seem to be affecting this age group as much, from what we’ve experienced.”

Now, the Owls are ready to break out while looking to break through to an elusive district title in 2020.