Kenny Bourgeois named head football coach at Patrick Taylor

A start-up prep football program at an excellent school in Avondale has its first head coach.

Kenny Bourgeois has been named the head coach at Patrick Taylor Academy.

Bourgeois was an all-state player at Jesuit, playing for Wayde Keiser before graduating in 2010. He signed with McNeese State out of high school but his college career was cut short by injuries. Bourgeois got his undergraduate degree from McNeese.

Bourgeois began his coaching career at McNeese as a student assistant before becoming an assistant at Hamilton Christian. He became a graduate assistant at Tulane from 2014-15 under Curtis Johnson, where Bourgeois obtained his Master’s degree.

Bourgeois coached at Riverside under Bill Stubbs in 2016 before going to Shaw under Tommy Connors in 2017 and coached with Marcus Scott at John Ehret in 2018-19.

“I liked the fact that I always wanted to be a head coach and this was a chance to do so and start it from scratch and to do it the way that I wanted to do it,” Bourgeois said. “I saw a lot of what to do and what not to do in my previous experiences. Getting a chance to do it from scratch is pretty cool.”

Bourgeois sees definite advantages to his opportunity

“Patrick Taylor is such a good school that you can set up a winning schedule and start to attract kids to it because it is a Magnet school,” Bourgeois said. “From what I’ve seen so far, the parental and community support for the school is really big. That lends itself to building something really successful.”

The Tigers will compete as a freshmen and middle school program for the 2020 season before becoming a junior varsity program in 2021. The varsity program is scheduled to begin in 2023.

“There is a lot of space on campus so we likely will be able to practice on campus and there is already a weight room on campus,” Bourgeois said. “There is a good future, to be certain.”

Bourgeois’ father, also named Kenny Bourgeois, is a former long-time assistant coach at Ehret, serving on the Patriots staff from 1987-2009. Bourgeois Sr. is going to return to coaching by handling the offensive line at Archbishop Hannan.