Interview: Scott Bairnsfather ready for unusual challenge as Interim coach at Jesuit

In the annuls of prep football history in the Greater New Orleans area, the storied Catholic League is the most glamourous league we have ever seen.

In fact, some would argue that it is the best league, the most celebrated league in Louisiana.

In the history of the league, no coach had ever served as the head coach of three of the member institutions.

That changed on June 18.

Mark Songy stepped down as head coach at Jesuit to become the Prefect of Discipline at the school.

Songy had served 11 years as head coach of the Blue Jays in two different stints, winning the Division I state championship in 2014, the eighth in school history but the first since 1960.

In 2017, Songy had the foresight to hire a proven head coach as his offensive coordinator.

Scott Bairnsfather left his job as head coach at his alma mater, Archbishop Shaw, to take over running the Jesuit offense in 2017, a position he served in through 2019.

Now, Bairnsfather is the Interim head coach of the Blue Jays, set to serve at least through the 2020 season. What happens beyond this season remains to be seen.

When Bairnsfather coaches his first game for Jesuit, he will become the first coach in Catholic League history to serve as the head coach at three schools in the league.

Bairnsfather served as the head coach at Holy Cross from 1997-2000 before serving as the head coach at Archbishop Shaw for 16 years (2001-2016). Bairnsfather took the Tigers to the playoffs three times and guided Shaw to the playoffs 15 times.

Bairnsfather previously served as defensive coordinator at Shaw. Bairnsfather compiled an 87-81 record with the Eagles.

Speaking on All Access on 106.1 FM Wednesday night, Bairnsfather admitted that he has heard the chatter about being the first to serve as head coach at three Catholic League schools.

“Yeah, I’ve heard that a few times,” Bairnsfather said. “I guess it means I’m getting old.”

While there was rumblings that Songy may be looking to depart the sideline for the administration for a few months, the move still came as a surprise.

“No, certainly not at the time that it transpired,” Bairnsfather admitted. “The COVID problem manifested itself in our disciplinarian deciding that it was time to retire. Among the three schools that I have been at, Top Abshire was great, just a terrific disciplinarian. It happened, they chose Mark which left a void in football.”

Bairnsfather is known widely for poking fun at himself in self-depreciating fashion and that humor has helped sustain him

“Looks like I drew the short straw,” Bairnsfather said. “Only Scott Bairnsfather has the luck that he takes the job in the middle of a global pandemic.”

At Holy Cross, Bairnsfather took over a rebuilding project and built it into a consistent playoff team.

At Archbishop Shaw, Bairnsfather took over for legendary coach and mentor Hank Tierney in a very tough, unfortunate circumstance for all involved. It left hard feelings and Bairnsfather had players leave and had to start over with his coaching staff.

“The other two jobs I took over, I basically had to change a lot of things,” Bairnsfather said. “At Holy Cross, I was a lot different coming in then what they were doing at the time. There were obvious coaching staff changes. The same thing happened at Shaw. Basically, the whole coaching staff left. There was a lot of turnover on the team. Both were kind of rebuilding or starting over points.”

The situation Bairnsfather takes over at Jesuit is markedly different.

“Mark had it going pretty good here,” Bairnsfather said. “We’ve been pretty good. We haven’t been dominant but we’ve been very competitive and the program is intact, so to speak. I’m just trying to keep it going. There are not a whole lot of changes to make. It is my job is to make it as smooth as possible in the transition.”

Bairnsfather coached at Shaw against Jesuit when the Blue Jays won the Division I state title in 2014.

“Any team that has a hot year or a hot couple of years can really do some damage in the playoffs,” Bairnsfather said. “Rummel was absolutely lights-out last year. It would have been hard for anybody in the state to beat them. Any other team, particularly with the split, can hot and win it. Jesuit showed that in 2014 with a very well coached team with a couple of great players and a lot of very good players. We’d love to have them right now.”

Most recently, Jesuit has competed very well, with excellent offensive and defensive fronts but has lacked the overall talent at so-called “skill” positions to beat the elite teams. That will be a bit different in 2020.

“Up front on both sides, we got hit by graduation,” Bairnsfather said. “We graduated all nine starters on the offensive and defensive lines. They were really good. We’re pretty good at linebacker with returning starters. Where we do have experience is the receiver spot. A lot of teams would like to have our receivers and we are pretty deep with as many as six guys who can play. I think we’re going to be pretty good at quarterback.”

Jesuit had a very good quarterback in Grant Jordan a year ago. He is at Yale now.

“We have two good quarterbacks,” Bairnsfather said. “I’m pretty confident in both of them. They did not have the benefit of spring practice. Grant was one of the best in the city and it was his only year starting. I feel the same way about Luke LaForge and Jack Larriviere, who have the capability of being as good as anybody, particularly with our strength at receiver.”

Bairnsfather knows how tough the Catholic League is.

“It’s really tough to play Curtis, when Rummel has a team like they had last year,” Bairnsfather said. “Brother Martin is typically good, year-in and year-out. St. Aug is always very talented. They had a chance to beat Rummel last year. The league is really tough. Our team was really good last year and we won just six games. I think that team could have won a lot of games in a lot of other leagues.”

The split among select and non select schools has provided an unfair competitive advantage to Catholic League schools, who have to play each other more than once a season very frequently.

“It is,” Bairnsfather said. “If you are Rummel, you were happy to play Catholic in the title game last year, not because Catholic is not good but you finally get to see someone that you haven’t been against.

“For us, we played Shaw and then Curtis in the playoffs last year. We beat Shaw but again, you’re playing them for the second time. It is not a comfortable feeling. We had a chance to beat Curtis in the playoffs. You don’t want to face a team a second time. I don’t think it’s good for the kids.”

As he serves as Interim head coach in 2020, does the future of Bairnsfather include possibly being the permanent head coach at Jesuit?

“I don’t have a mindset about it,” Bairnsfather said. “My mindset right now is I am the interim coach. I was honored for them to ask. I’ve only been there three years. I was the guy on the staff that had some experience coaching, particularly in the league as a head coach. There are a lot of other guys on our staff that could certainly do the job and I’m sure will be applying for the job in the future.”

Still, Bairnsfather, a proven commodity, would be more than worthy as a consideration for the job in 2021 and beyond.

“I think the school really wants to open the job and see what’s out there and make it a process,” Bairnsfather said. “I’m sure they will make the right decision and come up with the best coach for the future for Jesuit.”