New Athletic Directors Ready to Make a Difference

Marco Island’s two new athletic directors sure look the part. Young, athletic…All-American types. Both Jerry Miller and Matt Huneke look like sure-fire hires for Marco’s public charter high school and middle school.

Miller is the new AD at Marco Island Academy, where he has been an AD’s best friend for the past seven years. Now Miller will be in charge instead of being the glue guy for the ADs he served over the years.

Huneke comes to Marco Island Charter Middle School after a year at Lely High School where he was the assistant varsity soccer coach and taught physical education. Prior to that he was the AD at Manatee Middle School for four years.

When the AD position became available at MICMS, Huneke, a former college soccer player, wasted no time in applying.

"This was a good opportunity,” Huneke said, "and I jumped at it. (Principal) Michele Wheeler and the board of directors gave me an opportunity. I’m excited. I’m glad.”

Wheeler is happy to have the enthusiastic Huneke at the helm of the sports program. He will also be in charge of discipline at the school. 

“We are thrilled to have Matt as our new Dean of Discipline and Athletics,” Wheeler said. "His previous work with other athletics programs has proven to be a great asset. He has jumped in with both feet and hasn’t stopped.”

Melissa Scott, principal at Marco Island Academy, is happy to see Miller step into the AD role at her school. She sees it as a position Miller has earned.

“Since he began at MIA,” Scott said, “Jerry has been willing to help and assist in any capacity. During his tenure as a science teacher, he was always involved in athletics through coaching and acting as assistant athletic director. Through any and every change, Mr. Miller stepped up to help and has been a constant for our students and school. I am excited to see him take on this new, deserved role, while also continuing to teach his full schedule of classes. We are all ready to support him, as he’s done for us for so many years.”

Both ADs recognize the importance of working together. Huneke sees his role as getting a lot of students involved in sports at a young age while developing them athletically for high school, while Miller sees his role as providing the best atmosphere possible for student athletes to succeed.

“It’s important that the middle school and the high school stay kind of tied together,” Huneke said. "Especially when you’re their feeder school. It’s just communications. I’ve seen times where we’ve talked to high school coaches and said, ‘Hey, what do you like to run?’ From a basketball strategy, what plays do you like to run? Or in soccer, what formations do you like to run? This comes from a high school coach down to the middle school. We can teach them that program, so when they do go up to the high school, they’re somewhat comfortable with the system already. That’s definitely a valuable asset. It’s definitely important. Keeping the kids here on the island. Helping to build that program out at the high school level. We’re trying to build a foundation at the middle school. I’d love to play more games. Get the kids a little more competitive at the middle school level. I think we can definitely become very competitive at the high school level, because they’ll have that experience and foundation built up and ready to go.”

While Huneke is committed to making sure the middle school students are learning the fundamentals, he also wants to build a strong intramural program for those students who don’t make the school teams in sports where they have more players trying out than they can keep on the team.

"The big thing with the volleyball program is figuring out how are we going to help the girls who aren’t going to have the opportunity to play on the varsity or JV teams,” Huneke said. "We talked about building out an intramural program that I look to roll out in the spring. Getting those girls out there and learning the fundamentals and getting some intersquad games going. It’s tough with the competition. You’ve got your seventh and eighth graders who have kind of matured and are getting ready for high school sports. Your sixth graders kind of get left behind.”

Huneke said that while a lot of the sixth graders are athletic, they may not be as mature as the seventh and eighth graders. 

"You always feel bad for them,” Huneke said. "I’m big on providing the opportunities to get better and stronger. We’ll look to build out that intramural program with the sixth graders and seventh graders and get them ready for next year’s tryouts. That’s the big goal.”

Huneke also focuses on getting the middle school athletes ready to make that next step to high school.

“I’ve always focused on giving the kids the best opportunity to prepare themselves for high school, the next level,” Huneke said. "Especially from an athletic standpoint. Through the athletic program, we’re focused on education first. We focus on classroom first, teaching them the characteristics that translate to the field and the court: organization, responsibility, accountability. The good character traits that build a good citizen, a good person for our community."

Miller echoes Huneke’s sentiments.

“Our goal is helping the kids continue to achieve success and build confidence in themselves,” Miller said. "Sports is a great way to do that. At Marco Island Academy we always want to keep academics in the forefront of things. Hopefully, I can help encourage good academic performance as well as athletic performance. You want to be striving toward winning. That’s really important. That means your approach to practice, the game, even extending that into conditioning, nutrition, those sorts of things. But wins and losses, at the end of the day, are not my top priority. I’m more concerned with seeing the process, kids developing into fine young adults and being good students.”

MICMS has excelled in a number of sports over the years. Huneke is seeing great interest.

"There’s certain sports that we’re definitely strong in,” Huneke said. "Volleyball is one. We had a great turnout for tryouts. You can only take so many girls. We have a varsity team and a JV team. Great passion and the excitement from all the girls who showed up for the tryouts. We had 46 kids sign up for golf. We had a meet and greet the other day at the Rookery with the club pros there that are going to be coaching the team. They were really excited. They said, ’This is great. The more kids the better.’ I think we have six or seven matches. Every kid who signs up will get the lessons and the training. It’s going to be really good. Boys and girls basketball is going to be interesting. We’ve got quite a few soccer players. The boys and girls soccer club is pretty strong. We will do our best to fill out our track and field. We have about 40 kids signed up for cross country."

One sport that is currently not being played at MICMS is football. It's probably not coincidental that the MIA football program is mired in a seasons-long losing streak that has reached 29 games. MICMS once had a strong football program.

"Football is a tough sport,” Huneke reasons. "It takes a specific kind of athlete, I think. The Optimist league had a large turnout last season for football. I’ve seen five- and six-year-olds, right up to middle school. From a charter school standpoint it’s tough, because your numbers are low. You don’t have a big pick of the litter compared to a school that has 600 to 700 kids. We have 340 kids. I can see it if the community got together, the parents got together, and they really wanted to see football. I could see a modified version. Maybe a seven-on-seven. It’s not like flag; it’s a good competitive, physical sport that they run. It’s just modified. You’re not tackling. You’re not wearing the full pads. You’re not wearing the helmet. It limits the injuries. It limits kids getting beat up physically. There’s no hitting whatsoever. It’s basically like two hand touch. But your kids are learning the fundamentals. Your receivers are running routes, your running backs are running routes. Your offensive line is blocking and defensive backs and linebackers are all learning strategy. I feel like the game of football is becoming more strategic than it is physical. You see it in the NFL where they’re trying to limit the harder hits. They’re trying to protect the players. The players are getting injured. It’s getting to be more about what happens after the game when they’re retired. I think a seven-on-seven would be the perfect solution to service those parents who want to see their kids playing football and playing football at the next level in high school. Where they’re learning the game, but they’re also not hurting themselves. The possibility of getting hurt is not out of the equation, but this is a lot safer way to play the game.”

Miller is very pleased with the ways things are coming together at MIA. Their new gym has been operating for a year now. Their new athletic field is moving closer to completion every day. The weight room facility was recently stocked with state-of-the-art equipment.

"Can’t wait for the field,” Miller said, "very excited about the field. I think we’re going to have to wait just a little bit. But that’s okay. It’s been a long time coming. It’ll be done when it’s done. Hopefully, it’ll be functional for part of soccer and winter sports this year. Fingers crossed that it should most likely be done for lacrosse in the spring. We maximize the space that we have. There’s going to be a weight room, concession stands, detached locker room/restroom facilities. We should be able to host our sports by just being out at the field and not have to enter the actual school building itself - which I think is going to be really great for us. The football team will be able to practice on it. Right now they’re practicing at Tommie Barfield Elementary. That’s been great, we appreciate it. But I think Coach Lew Montgomery is really looking forward to being able to practice on campus. If weather comes in you can be back inside in minutes. And when the weather clears you can be right back at it in minutes. The weight room is going to be huge for our sports program, most notably the football team as they try to grow. Having an on-campus weight room should be quite a boon for that program.”

Looking toward the future, both ADs see success in store for Marco Island athletics.

"There are certain sports I think we can hone in on and become very competitive at a state level,” Huneke said, "soccer being one of them. We’ve got a lot of buy in from parents on the island, from a recreational standpoint. The Mexi League provides a very competitive league for our local kids. They’ve created a very competitive league from a Rec standpoint. There are a lot of club teams popping up in the Naples area lately. We’re trying to keep it on the island. It’s tough driving into Naples a couple of nights a week for practices. Marco has become a flourishing Rec club that competes in the Mexi League. We’ve got a lot of kids. Our age groups are growing. We started with one or two teams, now we have two or three teams for each age group. We have an A team and a B team, even a C team in some age groups. The numbers are definitely getting bigger.

“We’ve always had a good number of runners. If we continue to get this buy-in with golf, and the relationship we have with the Marriott letting us use their facilities at the Rookery and Hammock Bay, is invaluable. Beautiful courses and the club pros are our coaches. So they’re getting lessons from professionals. The same with tennis. The tennis team getting instruction from the professional at the YMCA is invaluable. I love when parents step up and volunteer to coach. But more parents are like, ‘I’m just here to help. I’m not a coach, I don’t have that kind of experience.’ We’re getting the opportunity with these coaches that are just next level - you’ve got to take advantage of it. I’m fully invested in working all day, every day to provide as much as possible for the kids.”

“The dream would be to where we’re excelling in all our programs,” Miller said, "both on the field and academically. I certainly think that’s achievable, especially now that the facilities are improving. Anything a young athlete would want, when looking at what high school to go to, we can pretty much offer now. Hopefully, that will inspire them to put in work, convince their friends to put in work as well, and get some strong teams going. It all seems so good right now, fantastic facilities, continued improvement. We’ve come a long way with the field and the weight room and all that. I think the challenge lies in making the most of it at this point. We’re set up well right now. So the challenge will be to utilize it and execute on the field and in the classroom and make the most of what we have.”