Rick Herrington will replace brother Mike as football coach at Hart

When Mike Herrington announced he was retiring after 31 years as football coach at Hart, one of his longtime assistants, brother Rick, indicated he was not interested in replacing him.

So how did it happen that Hart named Rick Herrington its new football coach on Thursday?

“Old people sometimes change their mind,” Rick, 60, said. “I was done coaching. I was fine. I was sitting around for a week or two with people in my ear. I said, ‘Shoot, I might as well try it.’ Now I’m excited.”

Rick has never been a varsity head coach. He was defensive coordinator at Hart and also helped coach with brother Dean at Alemany. His head coaching experience was as a freshman coach at Hart from 1978-79 and sophomore coach from 1980-87. He has been coaching for 42 years.

“All those interviews I went through in the past and never got one,” he said. “Maybe this is something I can do. This is a good place to be a head coach. I’ll have a pretty good mentor to ask questions.”

Rick, who graduated from Hart just like his brothers, is a teacher at the Newhall school.

He said Mike will not be on the staff. “He’ll probably be on the sideline second guessing,” he said.