‘It’s been a journey’: Impact of Danny Smith felt on different levels
by William Weathers // GeauxPreps.com Contributor
Danny Smith said when the topic of retirement was first presented to his family, the result was a split decision.
His two daughters were on opposite ends of the topic, while his wife of 37 years, Missy, who’s already retired, suggested the 67-year-old Smith remain at Parkview Baptist in his capacity as athletic director.
Smith had spent the past 45 years of his life in education, the last seven at Parkview Baptist, where he was an assistant in football and track, before taking over the school’s athletic director duties. He previously served as an assistant football coach for the school’s most successful coach, Kenny Guillot, where the Eagles won the first of five state championships in 2001.
Smith’s also been in the classroom, where four years ago, the son of a former Baptist preacher, taught New Testament bible when he replaced Darron Mitchell as athletic director for the 2022-23 school year.
He decided this would be his final year.
“I’ve been talking to my wife,” Smith said. “I told her I still have to find purpose in life. I’ve talked to Parkview about subbing. I told my principal (Daniel McCullough) that my wife is my new ‘why’. I tell the young coaches in this profession, having a spouse that understands a coach’s world is important. If they don’t, it could put a lot of pressure and strain on your relationship. I’ve spent more time away from home than I did at home.
“She knows me well enough that I’ve got to have things to do,” Smith said. “I’m not just a person that can sit around. That’s probably going to be my biggest adjustment early on, trying to plan a day. Right now, I’m just taking it all in.”
Smith won’t transition out of his office until the end of July. The school has announced the hiring of Joe Neal to become its new athletic director.
“Just the days, the hours,” Smith said. “It’s been a journey. It’s been awesome.”
Smith’s career in education began as a teacher and coach at Leesville and continued to DeRidder, Rosepine, Pickering, Parkview Baptist, St. Amant, and Dutchtown. He was also the athletic director at DeRidder and Pickering.
He was named the Louisiana Sports Writers Association’s Class 4A Coach of the Year in 1995 for leading Leesville to a 13-2 record and state runner-up finish.
Smith returned to Parkview Baptist to join the staff of head coach Stefan LeFors, where he coached defensive backs until taking on the school’s duties as athletic director.
“All of our programs have been successful,” Smith said. “It’s been a fun journey. Parkview’s unique, it’s very special. Some people look at it as a job. I’ve looked at it as my calling, my purpose. Long hours …That’s kind of part of it.”
Smith’s childhood was marked by a handful of moves that resulted in leaving his hometown of Brookhaven, Miss. The son of a Baptist preacher, Smith’s father Gerald relocated his family with each of his new church assignments to Ft. Hood, Texas, and Ft. Rucker in Dale County, Ala.
Smith recalled between his freshman and sophomore years in high school in Alabama, his mother quizzed him about his future and what interests he may have.
A young Smith, sitting on the family’s kitchen countertop, believed he wanted to coach.
“That was the first time I made that known to my parents,” he said.
Smith played football in the fourth, fifth, and sixth grades and was inspired to coach by two people: his father, who had become an active-duty chaplain in the Army, and one of college football’s most iconic coaches.
His father was his coach in the 9-10th grades, but it was the indelible images each Sunday morning on the television, watching the Paul ‘Bear’ Bryant show, and hearing the gravelly-voiced leader of the Alabama Crimson Tide.
“We would pass his home every time we went by the house of our music director,” Smith said of the church his father served as preacher in Northport. “My interest in coaching was this guy, following his career.”
Smith completed his final two years of high school at Zweibrucken American on an Air Force base in Pirmasens, Germany, which offered American football. He also played basketball and ran track.
“During the ‘70s, Europe had the largest deployment of American soldiers in the world,” Smith said of countries such as Germany, Belgium, and Italy.
Smith returned to the U.S. to attend Copiah-Lincoln Community College, playing both football and adding baseball and track in the spring.
During his time at Copiah-Lincoln, Smith’s father was assigned to Ft. Polk in Vernon Parish, and Danny transferred to McNeese State and finished work on his degree.
Smith got valuable hands-on coaching experience before his junior year at McNeese. His dad began a 5th-6th grade football team at Ft. Polk, and it was Danny running a split-back veer offense, and his dad handled the defense.
“We beat Leesville Junior High,” Smith said. “I was so pumped. I said, ‘This is pretty good. I like this.
Smith was also on the cusp of beginning a career he would give his heart and soul to for the next four-plus decades. He did his student-teaching at Leesville High School, but wanted to break into coaching and offered his services.
Newly hired Leesville coach Jerry Foshee, like Smith’s father, was a graduate of Mississippi College, took a liking to Smith during twice-a-day practices in the spring, and left a note one day for the young coach to visit with him.
With a full-time assistant leaving for Mississippi, Foshee approached Smith with the possibility of coaching the inside linebackers.
“I told him if he taught me, I could coach it,” Smith told Foshee. “I understood since I was student teaching, they couldn’t pay me. We went through two-a-days and then a spring scrimmage at Alexandria Senior High. I was coaching, and I was all in.”
Later that summer, Foshee called Smith before attending Sunday services and asked the 22-year-old college senior to meet afterward.
“My first thought was that he’s hired a coach,” Smith said.
Quite the opposite. Foshee committed to hiring Smith full-time upon his graduation from McNeese.
“He said that I had done a good job of handling my kids,” Smith said. “He said they wanted to hire me, and I said that would be great. He said that was the plan and to keep doing what I was doing. He said he wanted me to take over the defense next year.”
Smith’s rise to full-time assistant, fresh out of college at a Class 5A school, was uncommon but also showed a preference for coaching in high school.
With connections to Bobby Bowden at Florida State and Billy Brewer at Ole Miss, Foshee mentioned to Smith he could get the new college graduate a spot on either of their staffs if he had designs on coaching at that level.
Smith told his first coaching mentor he believed in wanting to build a family first and not jeopardize that by getting into the grind of the college game presented.
“He said he could help me, that he could get me a GA (graduate assistant) job,” Smith said. “I told him I wasn’t interested. I asked him why he wasn’t married but had a son. He said coaching in college was a big reason he wasn’t coaching because of the big demand. I told him I had dreams and visions of being a husband and a father. That was something I wanted to do.”
Smith was at Leesville High for seven years before leaving for Crowley High to coach under Lewis Cook, one of the state’s winningest coaches and an eventual Louisiana Sports Hall and LHSAA Hall of Fame member.
Smith had stacked up his share of memorable coaching influences during his first tenure at Leesville. He was the defensive coordinator for Jack Andre and Brownie Parmley, who were both head coaches with the Wampus Cats before Smith joined Cook’s staff.
Smith returned as defensive coordinator to Leesville for one season before he was named the school’s head coach in 1991.
He took over the program during a turbulent time when Ft. Polk had a reduction in soldiers, which directly impacted the enrollment at Leesville High School.
The Wampus Cats were competing in the state’s highest class in 5A, but without the comparable talent and depth, encountering some difficult times.
Four years after taking over the program, Smith led Leesville to the school’s first state championship game, where the Wampus Cats lost to Salmen, 39-7.
Smith’s still the second-winningest coach in school history with a 44-46 record – a span that included the opportunity to coach standout running back Cecil Collins. During his seven-year stay as an assistant coach, he was part of staffs that helped produce offensive lineman Kevin Mawae, who was inducted into the NFL’s Hall of Fame in 2019, and running backs Eddie and Vincent Fuller.
Moreover, Smith had created a sense of stability for a program that initially had some lean years. Leesville went to the state playoffs in four consecutive years, highlighted by the trip to the Superdome in ’95, and after a total of 16 years at the school, Smith left for the school’s arch-rival – DeRidder – for two years as head coach and athletic director in 1999.
“When I look back, those two years at DeRidder, it prepared us for what was going to come 10 years later,” Smith said.
The first foray at Parkview Baptist introduced Smith to Guillot, who was in the infancy stages of building the Eagles into a state power. They won three district championships and followed their first state title with three trips to the quarterfinals and one semifinal.
A two-year stay followed as defensive coordinator at St. Amant – where he was also the assistant athletic director – before a return to Vernon Parish. He was the defensive coordinator to head coach Johnny Cryer at Rosepine, later replacing him as head coach, where he spent eight years, before going onto Pickering for two years as defensive coordinator.
Smith ventured back toward the Baton Rouge area and was an assistant for two-time state champion head coach Guy Mistretta at Dutchtown when he left to join LeFors’ staff at Parkview Baptist.
When the athletic director’s position became open, the torch was being passed to Smith from one of his former students at Leesville, former Parkview baseball coach Darron Mitchell.
“I taught him and knew his family going back to the ‘80s,” he said. “His dad was a Southern Baptist preacher who pastored at a church in Leesville.”
In addition to his coaching duties, Smith taught the New Testament bible, an experience that brought him a sense of solace.
“I hadn’t been that relaxed in my profession in years,” he said.
Smith coached defensive backs and taught until he took the athletic director’s reins as athletic director in 2022.
With his previous experience, he was a natural for leading the school’s rich athletic tradition without skipping its core values.
Smith recalled his first meeting with the school’s coaches, sharing his vision for the Class 3A/Division III select athletic programs.
“I was going to be totally supportive,” he said. “My job was to give them the tools necessary for them to be successful. I didn’t believe in micro-managing, even when I was a head coach. I believed in overseeing and allowing coaches to do their job. You’re making sure it’s in compliance and the vision of what I wanted.”
Parkview Baptist’s enjoyed an explosion of 15 state championships since 2023 in girls’ basketball, girls’ and boys’ cross country, girls’ basketball, girls indoor and outdoor track, and girls’ soccer.
The Lady Eagles reeled off three straight state soccer titles until this year’s runner-up finish, and the indoor track team extended its streak to three straight state crowns in May.
Multi-sport athletes was a concept embraced by Smith and shared by his coaches who’ve worked in concert for the good of the school’s athletic programs.
“I told the coaches that they were going to win at Parkview,” he said. “To what level and degree, you don’t know. It takes some luck; it takes some coaches with a drive and a vision. Just being supportive as an administrator, giving them the means, the tools to be successful.”
The totality of the job, from attending every athletic event, providing support for coaches, to being in compliance with the LHSAA, takes a toll, and last fall, Smith’s wife probed into her husband’s welfare.
“I came home in November from an event and sat down,” Smith said. “My wife asked me if I felt OK. I felt like I’d hit a wall.”
Smith lives in close proximity to his two daughters and two granddaughters, ages 7 and 5.
“I live 25 yards from both of them,” he said. “We share two acres.”
One of the few excursions Smith enjoys with his wife has been heading to Bay St. Louis, Miss., an escape in late June that began six or seven years ago.
They’ve also enjoyed what’s evolved into a once-a-month trip to Toledo Bend, where Smith’s sister-in-law and husband own a home. There are also pontoon and bass boats, which have led to a couple of fishing expeditions where Smith’s latched onto 20-something white perch.
“I said, ‘I could enjoy this,’” Smith said.
With family in Leesville, Natchitoches, and Crowley, the Smiths look forward to additional time with family.
They’re deeply rooted in their church as a greeter and usher, respectively, at Healing Place, where they’ll maintain a sense of service and connectivity with fellow parishioners.
Smith will assist in Neal’s transition, and at the end of July, embarks on a life without practice, paperwork, or scoreboards.
“Yes, the winning and the losing, that’s what we’re judged by,” Smith said. “But our players judge us by the relationships that we’ve built. That’s the things coaches don’t need to forget. Coaching is a fraternity, but it’s an opportunity for us to touch and change lives. I’m leaving on a good note. There’s a lot of good stuff.
“All of these years, I’ve wanted to be a difference maker, both on and off the field,” Smith said. “My faith, my family, and building relationships have been my passion. This platform God has given me over these years has been awesome.”