Best in his Field: Catholic’s Sean Brady selected nation’s top track coach
by William Weathers // GeauxPreps.com Contributor
Little did Sean Brady realize 36 years ago that his transfer from Northwestern State after an injury-riddled football career would shape his life.
Brady, a former pole vaulter at Alexandria Senior High, wanted to rekindle his athletic career and concentrate on pole vaulting at Southeastern Louisiana.
“That was it,” Brady said. “I caught the bug and just fell in love with vaulting.”
It also represented an alliance with a sport that became of paramount importance in his life.
Brady volunteered for two years at LSU under iconic coach Pat Henry, later coaching with him for six years at Texas A&M, where Henry, a Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame inductee in 2021, retired following this past outdoor season. Brady was also an assistant coach for traditionally rich programs Arkansas and Texas, before serving as the head coach for 17 years at his alma mater, Southeastern Louisiana.
When it came time to consider another path to continue coaching the sport that had captured his heart, while having the requisite time to spend with his family, Brady opted to coach at the high school level for the first time and has spent the past four years at Catholic High in Baton Rouge.
The same program that former coach and Louisiana Sports Hall of Famer Pete Boudreaux built into one of the state’s best, winning 52 state championships in indoor and outdoor track, along with cross country. He also played a part in getting Brady to consider moving to Catholic High, where he could coach at the state’s highest level and still be able to carve out a lifetime of memories with his family.
Catholic High swept the last two state indoor and outdoor track championships under Brady, including two in the past athletic calendar by a point over Jesuit and 12 points over Scotlandville.
Brady has subsequently been honored by the United States Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association as both its Coach of the Year on the statewide and national levels.
“I’m very honored and humbled to receive this,” Brady said. “This is really a team award. It doesn’t happen without the support of Catholic High and the great coaching staff that I’ve got. I celebrate it as an individual, but it’s really about the team, the (Brothers of the Sacred Heart) mission and what we’ve been able to accomplish over the last few years.”
Brady is the second such recipient of the award, which Boudreaux won in 2016, and also joins the school’s baseball coach Brad Bass in being recognized as a national coach of the year.
Bass, who guided the Bears to a national championship in 2025, was named the national Coach of the Year by four different outlets that included MaxPreps.com, Prep Baseball Report, Baseball America, and the National Federation of High Schools.
“We feel like we’ve got the best track coach in America; there’s no doubt in our minds,” Catholic High athletic director Matt Shelton. “I know there’s a lot of them and these awards are not going to go to the same people every year. They recognize his talent, his attention to detail, his love for competition.
“It’s great to win all of these track meets and to win championships,” Shelton said. “To me, the fun part is to watch how he and his staff impact our kids. That’s the most important part to us. They’re doing it the right way, and that is paramount for us.”
Rodney Brown replaced Boudreaux as head track and field coach while Boudreaux remained as the school’s head cross country coach. The Bears won the state outdoor championship in 2022 and were the state indoor runner-up when Brady was hired in 2023 to become the school’s head coach in track.
“It was an adjustment,” Brady said of his first foray into coaching and teaching at the high school level. “Coaching’s coaching, but the routine of high school, having to be in the classroom and coach, was different. I had recruited kids from Catholic High over the years as a college coach and had developed a relationship with Coach Boudreaux. He was instrumental and influenced my decision quite a bit.
“We knew the family wanted to get closer to home and I hadn’t really thought about coaching in high school,” Brady said. “Things happen. My AD (Jay Artigues) was friends with the AD (Ben DiPalma) at Catholic, and Pete got involved. I’m on a recruiting visit and get a call from Catholic, and here you go. Now I’m not missing my son’s football and basketball games because I’m out recruiting. He goes to school with me every day and comes home with me every day. It’s been a real blessing.”
Brady envisioned being a part of two sports at Northwestern State, where he was a ‘scrawny’ defensive back who enjoyed contact but instead had to endure four surgeries on his knees and ankles in 2 ½ years.
“I got tired of sitting on the sideline because I was injured,” he said. “I loved football equally to track. There’s nothing better than being in the locker room after a big win. Track was different. It’s an individual sport and intrinsically filled the void that I had. I thought it would be a much safer experience, but as it turns out you just trade injuries when you move from sport to sport.”
Shelton said it wasn’t realistic to seek out a candidate as accomplished as Pete Boudreaux when they first hired Brown and later Brady.
“You don’t find the next Pete Boudreaux,” he said of the man who spent 57 years coaching at the school where he still maintains an office despite retirement in 2024. “You bring in Rodney Brown who was a great coach, and he won a state title his last year. You don’t look for the next Pete; you bring in a Sean Brady. He’s his own man with an unbelievable attention to detail for track.”
Brady has immeasurable respect for the influence that Boudreaux and Henry had on his career.
“We communicate pretty regularly,” he said of Boudreaux. “I get some fatherly advice. Nobody knows Catholic High better than Pete Boudreaux.”
Henry, a 36-time national champion in both men’s and women’s indoor and outdoor track, won 27 of his national titles during 17 seasons at LSU where he also won 18 Southeastern Conference indoor and outdoor championships. He retired after his 21st season at Texas A&M, which won nine national titles and 18 Big 12/SEC championships.
“I’ve known him for almost 30 years since I got my start at LSU as a volunteer,” Brady said of Henry. “It was a great experience to work for him at A&M, and I’m glad I got to do that before he retired. He’s definitely the (Greatest of All Time) GOAT. Now that I’ve worked in high school, I’ve been around two guys that are about as good in the business as there are anywhere.”
During his collegiate coaching career, Brady was part of schools that won six national championships, helped to develop 36 All-Americans and 37 athletes that won SEC titles.
Catholic was the state runner-up in both the indoor and outdoor championships in Brady’s first season.
“When we brought in Sean, and you see the level of detail that he put into track and field, and it’s incredible,” said Shelton, who served as track and field coach for seven years at his alma mater, Parkview Baptist. Our school has a very proud track tradition and rightfully so. To see what Sean does with Corey Mistretta as his lead assistant and Don Hood (throws coach), we’re just fortunate to have the right people. They’re pulling the rope in the same direction, and Sean gets to set that direction.”
Because of the efforts of Boudreaux before him, Brady has the rare opportunity to lead a program with more than 100 athletes. He coached three athletes in this past season who signed college scholarships in Peter Watson (UL), Henry Mensman (Rice) and Jack Torrence (South Alabama).
“Half of those are cross country and distance kids; they had 50 kids out there training in the summer,” Brady said. “The kids we get are hardworking, overachievers. We get a stud that comes out, but the majority of them are pretty average in talent, but they’re willing to work, and they’ve bought in and want to see something great happen. Pete built a tremendous tradition at Catholic, and I’m just riding on his coattails, trying to uphold the tradition he built years ago.”
Going into the final two events in the 2025 state outdoor meet, Catholic trailed Jesuit by nine points. The Bears picked up a point in the 3,200 meters and defeated Ruston in the 4×400 relay behind the efforts of Mensman, William Decuir, Harrison Lalande and Cannon Duncan to win the meet, 61-60.
The same two schools were at it again in February’s state indoor championships where Catholic duplicated its one-point victory. The Bears’ strength, the relay events, shone brightly once again with victories in the 4×200 and 4×400 events, with a second place in the 4×800.
Senior Jack Torrance delivered a runner-up performance in the shot put along with a 2-3 showing from Lalande and Mensman in the 400.
Torrance, the great grandson of former LSU’s NCAA discus and shot put champion and Olympian Jack Torrance, provided the Bears with a roadmap to their 12-point win over Scotlandville for the year’s team outdoor championship.
Torrance’s 58-foot-and-quarter effort not only broke his own personal best, but he defeated nemesis Joseph Carter Rivet of Alexandria (57-2 ¼) to win the shot put. He was also third in the discus.
Pole vaulter John Overton also picked up a win in the field for the Bears.
“When your senior thrower wins with a PR in the shot put and beats the kid who’s been beating him all year long, that was a big spark for us,” Brady said of Torrence, whose great grandfather is a member of the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame (1961) and USTAF Hall of Fame (2015), and whose father Matt helps Hood coach the throwers. “Having Jack win and PR in the biggest meet of his life, kind of set the tone for our team.”
The Bears captured two of four relays and were second in the other two races.
The team of Patrick Kelly, Augustin Juneau, Watson and Decuir were first in the 4×800, and the 4×200 team of Joshua Dowdell, Lalande, Carson Rice and Mensman was also victorious. The Bears were second in both the 4×100 and 4×400 events.
Decuir, who also ran a leg on the 4×400 team, won the 800, and Jaden Moffitt, who was Catholic’s first qualifier in the 100 in four years, was fifth in the event in addition to his leg on the 4×100. Dowdell was second in the 200 and ran legs on both the 4×100 and 4×200 relay teams, and Mensman, third in the 400, ran legs on the 4×200 and 4×400 relays.
“We hit just about as well as we could,” Brady said. “Winning track meets is about having your kids hit on the same day and perform well on the same day. We had 13 that qualified, and we scored in every event we were able to enter. We had PRs in almost every event area. They were ready. They were focused, and once the meet started, they just kept piling up points.”
Shelton says Brady’s competitiveness and work ethic resonate with his competitors.
“Our kids are not entitled to much, but they’re entitled to coaches that work harder than they do,” he said. “We’ve got a lot of great coaches on our campus, but there might not be any better than Sean in what he does. He’s really first class. We’re very fortunate.”