For the 15 years he worked in New York as an investment banker for J.P. Morgan, Rod Azar envisioned himself coaching football. When he returned to the area a little over two years ago, he joined the staff at Tunkhannock as an assistant coach.
Thursday night, he was named Tunkhannock’s new head coach.
The Tunkhannock school board hired Azar at its meeting, bringing an end to a search that began at the end of the 2010 season after Frank Berardelli stepped down after three years with the program. Azar had been an assistant with the Tigers for the previous two seasons.
“Having been an assistant under Frank has given me a lot of good insight into the program,” Azar said. “I played at Tunkhannock 20 years ago, so I know the school well, I know the kids well and the familiarity is going to help.”
Tunkhannock has a 9-21 record over the last three years and Azar’s first order of business will be to try and increase the number of players on the roster.
“The biggest thing I want to do is get the participation up,” Azar said. “Frank did a tremendous job, and I want to build on the culture he developed. We have to get the numbers up. We had 35 on the sidelines the last few years and we are playing 3A schools and our non-conference opponents are 4A because everyone wants to play Tunkhannock to get the (bonus) points. We have a tough schedule against teams that have 50-80 players on the roster. If we are going to compete consistently, we have to have the kids to do it.”
At its January meeting, the board voted 5-4 against offering Azar the job, instead offering it to Rich Mannello. When Mannello could not accept the position, the search reopened and the board decided to offer the job to Azar.
“A process like this does not always go fast and as smoothly as you would like it to,” Azar said. “I just hung in there and hoped for the best. In the last week or so it has been presented to me. I am not going to worry about the path to get here, I am just happy about the opportunity.”
