Conversation with Coach – Mark Lyons, Central Valley
Tagged under: Coaches Corner, District 7, News, pfn
Phil Myers | August 21, 2024
Central Valley has only ever had one football coach, the Beaver County Sports Hall of Famer, Mark Lyons. Coach Lyons has led the Warriors to 5 WPIAL titles and 4 PIAA state championship game appearances, winning the state gold medal twice. But it was a devastating loss to Wyoming Area in 2019 that made Lyons and his staff better coaches and the returning players a better team for the next couple years as they won the PIAA 3A championship in 2020 and 2021. How can that be you might ask after all the success Central Valley had since its inception in 2010. The answer comes later in this interview along with some other interesting tidbits and answers from Coach Lyons.
Ed and Delores Lyons (both deceased) raised Mark and his four siblings (brothers Ed Jr., Gary, and Michael along with sister Terri) in Monaca, PA. Mark, the middle child of the five, went to Monaca High School where he played football, basketball, and baseball. As a junior, Mark’s basketball team won the state championship by beating Elk County Catholic in the finals. As a senior, his football team won a WPIAL championship by defeating the always tough Clairton Bears. Coach Lyons said he was a running back and a defensive back in high school. He graduated from Monaca H.S. in 1983.
He went to the Penn State Beaver Campus and played baseball which was his first love at the time. Mark was going to be an accounting major and transfer to the main campus in State College but changed his mind. “After about a year and a half, I just couldn’t see myself sitting behind a desk,” he said. Meanwhile, Alan Guandolo, the head football coach at Monaca who coached Lyons, asked if he’d come on board as a volunteer in 1986.
Lyons said he fell in love with coaching the sport. Guandolo told him he had a knack for coaching and he should go into education because most coaches back then were in education. “At that point I enrolled at Geneva College and got my teaching degree and the rest is obviously history,” Lyons stated.
He continued as an assistant coach until the fall of 1996 when he got his first job as head coach which was at his alma mater, Monaca. Mark was at Monaca for five years, then took the Mt. Pleasant job for seven years. He wanted to get closer to home, so he was an assistant at New Brighton in 2008. Then he became Freedom’s head coach for a year before his stint at Central Valley began when Monaca and Center merged in 2010. All in all, heading into the 2024 season, Lyons is beginning his 39th year of coaching and 2024 will be his 28th year as a head coach. His overall record as head coach is 217-100. His 14-year record at Central Valley is 144-35 which is phenomenal.
Family has always been an important part of Coach Lyons’ career as we will see. In addition to his wife Diane, Mark’s family includes two children, his son Marcus and his daughter Kaitlyn. Lyons is currently a Middle School Science teacher at Central Valley.
PM: “How were you able to help Central Valley’s football program be a winner from the start and then maintain that winning atmosphere through the years?”
ML: “Well, in 2010 (Central Valley’s first year) I’m taking two communities, two starting quarterbacks, 2 starting running backs, the whole way down the roster. They’ve all been full time starters. Now I have to let them know that they’re going to compete (for a starting position). Obviously, I can only put eleven out there.”
“I put together a great staff. At one point I think I had six ex-head coaches. My head coach got on board. We didn’t get off to a good start that first year. We scuffed around a bit. Then we got hot. We were the 14th seed out of 16 and actually won the WPIAL championship. A lot of people have told me that the merger may not have gone as well if we hadn’t had success right off the bat. A lot of people were still questioning the merger. Our players were great, but a lot of the adults questioned it.”
“Of course, the athletes were there too, beginning with Foster (Robert) and Whitehead (Jordan). It started to snowball and my job was to make sure I didn’t get in the way of it and to keep it rolling. To me, that first group that I had at Central Valley will always be special because of how they handled it.”
PM: “How long do you foresee yourself continuing to coach.”
ML: “You know that’s a good question. Obviously, I think that question is coming sooner than later. I’m going to have to answer that in my own vision. I do take it year to year. I know this. The minute I lose that willingness to prepare and put the hours in Sunday through Thursday then that’s when I have to have that inner conversation with myself. It’s not so much the games. It’s my passion and drive.”
PM: “How about support from your family because, correct me if I’m wrong, but coaching today is a year-round job?”
ML: “It is. It is. You are 100% correct. My family has always been part of what I’ve done. My kids grew up around it. They were involved with me. My daughter was always a ball girl, a water girl till she wanted to sit in the student section along with my son. My brothers (he pauses in thought), my sister…. I don’t think she has missed a game even when I was at Mt. Pleasant. She’s usually the first one in the stadium. Those are special things to me.”
“There’s something I’m going to miss more, because he recently passed a few years ago is not seeing my father waiting for me outside the gate and having that conversation and knowing the satisfaction he had on Friday nights. It’s important to have people around you who understand and allow you to do what you do. To allow you to chase that dream. I’m not in this by myself. I can tell you that.”
PM: “What is the toughest thing you find about coaching?”
ML: “I think the toughest thing as a coach is, even in today’s game, you still have to provide them (the players) with a strong foundation of a structure and some discipline. People say kids change, this has changed, that has changed. But I still don’t think the change is as drastic as we make it out to be. There may be more disruptions and outside interference, but at the end of the day they still welcome that hard conversation you have to have sometimes. That tough love we sometimes have to give them, I believe that’s a key to our success. The numbers are still there and the program is still growing.”
PM: “What do you enjoy the most about coaching?”
ML: “Anyone will tell you at any level, it’s the parallels that it has with life. It’s a tough game. I think it prepares them later on in life.”
PM: “What is the most important concept you try to teach your players?
ML: “I always reference we want to be givers, not takers. That’s in everything. We want to give energy, not take energy. We want to give ourselves. We don’t want to just receive for ourselves. And that’s a team aspect.”
We went on to talk about kids today. Coach Lyons told me that he has never cut a kid from the football team. Kids have quit, but he always gives kids, who did something they shouldn’t have, options in fixing the problem. “When kids do make bad decisions, you have to look at why,” he said. Lyons also stated that he’s not there to bail them out, but to help them get through whatever the situation may be.
PM: “From when you first started coaching, how has it changed in your opinion?”
ML: “That’s a good question. What has really changed is all these special people wanting a piece of that kid. There’s a monetary cost for these trainers, but there’s no assurance it’s going to help that kid. I’m not going to be the guy to tell them ‘No.’ I’m not going to tell the parents that’s a bad idea. I tell them if you are going to go to a trainer or someone who thinks they can make them better, make sure the team is your number one priority. I will support them. If they miss a summer workout to go to say a travel 7 on 7, I’m not going to get upset.”
“It’s probably the biggest challenge today. When I started out, they only had me. They only had me for the weight room. They only had me for doing stuff in the summer. Now, there are so many special trainers. We (as a coaching staff) want to get the kids to where they are the healthiest and then they can perform to their best ability.”
PM: What is the biggest thrill you have gotten out of coaching to date?”
ML: “Funny you ask that, seeing what happened today with Jordan Whitehead. Him standing at a podium starting a foundation called Whitehead’s Wishes. The foundation will offer financial and emotional support, and guidance to young kids that not only participate in sports, but in the arts. What he said was we’re not going to just hand out a scholarship, we’re going to go to their dance recitals. We’re going to follow them through their piano lessons. And it could be academic (guidance and support) too.”
“To me, when your ex-athletes go on and become successful people in the community and when they see you and thank you, especially the ones you had to discipline, when they come and thank you and say coach ‘I needed that’ … to me, that’s just an awesome, awesome feeling.” (Coach Lyons did not mention a single player’s name to me that he had to discipline, and I did not ask.)
NOTE: Jordan Whitehead was drafted by Tampa Bay and played safety four years for the Bucs. He then signed and played for the New York Jets the past two seasons, but re-signed with Tampa Bay for the coming 2024-25 year. He has 11 interceptions in his 6-year career, and has been in on 444 tackles.
PM: “Coach, what do you want your legacy to be?”
ML: “I don’t know about that word. I’m not a big fan of that word. Here’s why – the one thing that rubs me the wrong way is when people say that’s my team, those are my players. I don’t like that pronoun. So, if I were to tell you what my legacy is going to be, it’s just that I want them to understand that I gave everything. I had their well-being. I treat them as if they were my own. I gave them tough love. I gave them some true love to try to help them be successful.”
“At the end of the day, I’d like to say every place I’ve been and probably every person I’ve come in contact with, I’ve tried to make it better than before I got there. I’m a school teacher and I try to do that in the classroom too. I have the same passion, same passion.”
PM: “Is there anything you’d like to see changed in the high school game itself?”
ML: “What we do is a trickle-down effect of what’s going on above us. How to really answer that question is I don’t really like what’s going on at the college level with the transfer portal. Obviously, players see that and sometimes they’re trying to treat high school as if they were in the transfer portal. You know, going from school to school. And Phil, I’m not naïve to this. We’ve gotten kids and lost kids. We got kids who came into our program. I get it. It’s becoming a little rabid right now. I don’t think those guys realize how influential their decisions are and how they affect high schools.”
PM: “Good thoughts. Let’s do what I call some fun questions now. If you could talk to any football coach, past or present, who would it be?”
ML: “I would love to sit down with Chuck Noll.” (the ex-Steeler head coach)
PM: “What do you do with your spare time?”
ML: “That’s another good question. In the last 10 years I enjoy golf even more. I enjoy taking care of my flower beds, things like that around the house.” He thought a moment or two and added the following, “At some point I’ll have to separate this, but I always had to be involved in something that we were keeping score. My spare time is filled with competitive things. That’s changing though. Up until a year ago I played pick-up competitive basketball games. People always say, ‘don’t you ever stop.’ I just fear if I stop, everything is going to stop. But to answer your question, maybe the game of golf.”
PM: “You sit down to dinner, what would your favorite consist of?”
ML: “My favorite meal is a good steak on the grill with mushrooms. Love that combination. Love asparagus on the grill and with some risotto.”
PM: “To top it off, what would your favorite dessert be?”
ML: “My favorite dessert would be cherry pie.”
PM: “Do you have any favorite movies?”
ML: (He laughs.) “This is kind of funny and I get teased about it. I’m a sucker for movies that are emotional. I don’t go to movies because I get very emotional. You know, ones that are tear jerkers. ‘Brian’s Song’ I cried like a baby. When I watch these kind of movies (at home) many times my wife will look over at me and say, ‘please tell me you are not crying.’” We both laugh and he says to use his wife’s quote in the article.
PM: “If you could go back in time, is there anyone you’d love to meet?”
ML: “I’d love to talk with John Wooden.” (The former UCLA basketball coach who won 7 NCAA titles in a row and 10 in 12 years back in the 60s and 70s.)
PM: “What’s the one thing most people don’t know about you?”
ML: “I probably already shared that. I am an emotional guy. I come across as this guy who coaches hard and everything and people see my persona that way, but get me in front of a movie that is kind of emotional and you are going to see a side of me that people will say, ‘is this the same guy we see on Friday?’’
We talked a bit more and share a few laughs. Coach Lyons is very insightful. Then I ask a tough question that I thought would bring back haunting memories.
PM: “How did you handle that devastating loss in 2019 to Wyoming Area when they came back in the 4th quarter to win the state championship game? Did losing that game help in any way? I’ll just put that out there for you to answer.”
ML: “You know what? Great question! I always reference that game. I deal with it a lot better when I reference it this way: We were not ready to win at that time. I say that, and it starts with me on some of the decisions and some of the approach. Maybe we, as coaches, took some things for granted because we had such an easy time leading up to those games (playoffs). Maybe our players will value time spent moving forward and obviously they did.”
“You know, the following year we never talked about what happened with Wyoming Area. I didn’t have to. Our guys’ hunger, drive, and approach that next year…. I knew from day one they had laser focus. I knew that game was going to serve some benefits for us moving forward. Obviously, it did. It would have been nice to win three in a row, but who knows. If we win the Wyoming Area game, maybe we would have gotten complacent and not won the game the next year against Wyomissing. I learned a lot and we learned a lot as a coaching staff.”
PM: “Is there anything you thought we’d talk about and didn’t that you want to touch upon?”
ML: “I collect quotes. My phone, my notes, my notebook…. I collect quotes. I’m a quote guy. I’ll take a quote and try to put my own little spin on it. I’m real intrigued by that.”
I told him I collect quotes too and use mostly Christian quotes in an adult Sunday School class I teach. “I’m glad you said that,” Lyons states, “because I had a guy in our community here that was a successful basketball coach, Jim Deep, who won a state championship with Aliquippa. He approached me back in 2012, 2013 and he wanted to start FCA with us. Somebody was speaking to me because I said to him absolutely, let’s do this. Jim founded the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA) for students at Central Valley. Jim has since passed away and we have another ex-coach come in. It has impacted us whether we get 7 or 27 kids. We don’t force it upon anybody. It’s valuable to us, it’s been valuable to me, very valuable.”
Coach shared some stuff off the record as we conversed another ten minutes or so. I thoroughly enjoyed our talk and wish he and his team the best of luck. It is apparent that Coach Lyons makes an impact on his coaches, his teams, and his students. For Central Valley and the community, Mark Lyons may have been one of the best investments they ever made. Additional note: Central Valley is the #1 ranked team in the 3A classification according to PFN’s 2024 preseason poll.
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