‘One of the good guys’: Death of former Jennings High coach Rusty Phelps far reaching
by William Weathers // GeauxPreps.com Contributor
It wasn’t until 1993 that Rusty Phelps migrated south.
A native of Winnfield and graduate of Northwestern State, Phelps spent the first eight years of coaching career in Mississippi and North Louisiana before joining head coach Bobby Keasler’s coaching staff at McNeese State. He served as a graduate assistant, helping with the Cowboys’ defense for two seasons.
During that time, he struck up a friendship with head coach Matt Viator, later joining him at Jennings as defensive line coach, and became the Bulldogs’ head coach at the urging of Viator and the school’s principal Gene Van Hook.
That began a nearly three-decade association for Phelps and Jennings High, endearing himself to the Jeff Davis Parish community he called home. He coached the Bulldogs to 200 of his 213 wins and guided them to a state championship appearance in 2019.
“I was very fortunate to stay this long here,” Phelps told The American Press on Nov. 3, 2022, the week before coaching his final game. “When I took this job 29 years ago, this was where I wanted to be. I was very fortunate to end my career here. This place has been good to me. The community has been good to me. I have had a lot of senior classes go through here, and I enjoyed playing at Jerry Simmons Stadium.”
The same tight-knit community is wiping away tears after news of Phelps’ passing on Saturday from the results of a stroke he suffered the day before.
He was 62.
“It didn’t matter where he was from, wherever he was going to end up, he was going to be right at home,” said Notre Dame coach Lewis Cook Jr., a member of both the Louisiana Sports and LHSAA Halls of Fame. “He talked to people. He had a south Louisiana mentality because he made it quite well down here. He may be from somewhere else, but he became a Jennings guy. Rusty would fit in a lot of places because of who he was and how he handled himself.”
Phelps served as Jennings’ head coach for 28 seasons, leading the Bulldogs to 200 wins, reaching the state playoffs 25 times with a magical trip to the Louisiana Superdome in 2019.
Jennings reversed course after an 0-3 start and advanced to the Class 3A state championship game for the first time in 27 years, falling to St. James. The Bulldogs had also been in the quarterfinals eight times and semifinals twice.
“He just seemed like he belonged in Jennings,” Paul Trosclair, former head coach at Eunice, where he still serves as an assistant. “They had a good run there. They were successful and always had good players.”
Trosclair, who retired as head coach in 2020, enjoyed a special relationship with Phelps.
As part of the annual Eunice-Jennings series, they coached against one another 25 times in the second week of the regular season, forming a bond that endured.
“To me, it was the way high school football should be,” Trosclair said. “You play to win. You coach to win, and when you don’t win, you shake hands and get ready for the next one. Rusty was one of the good guys. We always had a very intense game.
“We never had an issue with sportsmanship,” Trosclair said. “It was always clean. The games were usually tight, and we had all sorts of crazy games, and when it was over, we shook hands, and it was all good. That’s the kind of guy Rusty was.”
Phelps was a manager for one season under head coach Larry Dauterive at Winnfield, where the Tigers reached the Class 3A state championship game against Jesuit (now Loyola Prep) in 1976.
He went on to graduate from Northwestern State and later began his coaching career at Humphreys Academy in Belzoni, Miss., where he said he learned fundamentals, such as tackling and protecting the football, during his three-year stay under coach Dominic Belvaque.
Phelps’ evolution continued upon his return to his home state, where he coached at now defunct Newellton for three seasons. After a 1-9 opening, a trying season with 14-15 players on his roster, Phelps improved participation significantly were 53 of the 75 boys in school were on the football team.
The 13 overall wins paled in comparison to the lessons Phelps learned coaching at a Class 1A school.
“That experience taught me how to coach, how to work a field, cut the grass, get the concession stand ready,” he told The American Press, which named him Coach of the Year three times during his career. “We were a Class A high school with one assistant.”
With a defensive mind, Phelps was paired with Kirby Brucchaus for two years at McNeese, further increasing his coaching acumen and preparing him for the next step, and when Viator called, he was ready to put down roots in Jennings.
Jennings won its second state championship under Viator in 1992, but the school hadn’t made it back to the Superdome until Phelps took the Bulldogs back in 2019.
The Bulldogs seemed an unlikely candidate to make a deep postseason run in ’19, entering the postseason seeded 23rd. They went on to upset four of the top teams until running into St. James.
“He was a good coach, they were always fundamentally sound,” Trosclair said. “They always had one or two players that were always outstanding. The rest of the guys were hard-nosed like the Eunice High kids. They would get after you. They didn’t give you anything really easy. It was always tough.”
The Eunice-Jennings series was regarded amongst the best in the state and dated to the end of World War II.
Trosclair, who was 237-107 during his LHSAA Hall of Fame career, took over for legendary Johnny Bourque in 1995, the same time Phelps succeeded Viator, who left for Sulphur.
“It was just a clean rivalry,” Trosclair said. “If you could draw it up, it’s what you would want in high school football.”
Eunice had alternated between Class 4A and 3A, while Jennings remained a Class 3A program, and the results of their annual meetings were nothing short of intense and well played with terrific sportsmanship after the final whistle.
“He won over 200 games as a head coach; that tells you he could coach and he was around for a long time,” Trosclair said. “Rusty was just consistent. You knew what to expect from him. You could call Rusty any time and talk to him. If you needed help with something, he was willing to give it to you. That’s just the kind of guy he was.”
The game’s competitiveness was an early gauge of that season’s success for either team.
“It was a good indicator,” Trosclair said. “Usually, the games were tight. Our players kind of sensed that it was kind of a rivalry. If we played well, I could tell we were going to have a good team.”
Trosclair and Phelps once served as assistants in 2009 under Durell Peloquin in the annual Bayou Bowl in Baytown, Texas. Their team had lined up for a potential tying field goal, but mishandled the snap.
“I had always liked Rusty,” Trosclair said. “He was such a great guy. He was a great storyteller with a good sense of humor. He was just the kind of guy everybody liked.”
Trosclair said he still looked forward to visiting with Phelps, who remained the head coach at Jennings two years after Trosclair’s retirement. When Phelps stepped down after the 2022 season, Trosclair could still find him before games when the Bobcats and Bulldogs clashed.
“You could talk to Rusty any time,” he said. “I still help Eunice High, and when we played, I’d go talk to Rusty before the games. We’d talk for 10 to 15 minutes, and he always had a good story to tell. He was a funny guy.”
Cook, the state’s third-winningest coach with a 417-104 record and five state titles, had recruited Jennings during his time as offensive coordinator at then USL (now UL). During the team’s run to the Class 3A state title, a 16-13 win over Eunice, Cook was also friends with Viator, and when Phelps took over the program, their friendship grew as well as their respect for each other.
“He was one of the nice guys in this business,” Cook said. “Everybody liked him. He always had time for anyone when you called or went by school.”
That association turned competitive when Cook returned to coaching at the high school level and launched his incredible run at Notre Dame, where the Pioneers have won four state titles and 317 games in 29 of his 41 years as a head coach.
Notre Dame and Jennings spent time in the same district, also played in a handful of non-district games, and wound up opposing one another in the second round of the playoffs in 2000. The Pios won, 13-0.
“We had some really good games,” Cook said. “We got to know each other fairly well. We became good friends.”
Cook wanted to work with him, and when Phelps announced he was retiring, the wheels were put in motion for a possible alliance.
In an effort to add an experienced coach, Cook reached out to Phelps about the possibility of him joining his staff in the event that he still wanted to coach a position.
Phelps visited with Cook, who learned about the health of Phelps’ father, who eventually passed away. While they weren’t able to join together on the same sideline, they remained friends.
“I wanted to see if he still had the energy to coach a little bit in a more relaxed situation,” Cook said. “Sometimes it’s not all that fun being a head coach. You’re having more fun when you’re just coaching a position. Selfishly, it was just to have his experience and demeanor. I knew how he treated the kids. He would have been a perfect fit with us. Just to have another set of eyes, and that he had a great deal of experience. He was a good person that was in it for the kids.”
Phelps may have been best known as the head coach of future NFL running backs – brothers Travis (Jacksonville Jaguars) and Trevor Etienne (Carolina Panthers) –, but he sent more than his share of players to the collegiate ranks.
He was also a teacher at the school where his wife, Martha, was a teacher, and his son, Peyton, is currently the school’s defensive coordinator.
The school shared a heartfelt message about Phelps’s impact on its Facebook page:
“Coach Phelps was more than a coach; he was a mentor, a role model, and a steady presence in our community. His legacy lives on in every life he touched, every lesson learned, and every memory shared. Rest easy, Coach. Thank you for the years, the guidance, and the heart you gave so selflessly. You will always be a part of Jennings. And your legacy will live on.
Said Trosclair: “It’s just sad to lose a guy like Rusty.”