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WEIRTON – The old adage is that if want to get a job done, find a busy man to do it. Weir High stayed true to that when it named Rick Stead the new head girls basketball coach.
He was approved at Monday’s Hancock County Board of Education meeting and will begin his duties immediately, replacing the veteran Bill Smith, who retired earlier this summer after 27 years at the helm of the girls program.
“We have four starters returning for the upcoming season,” said Stead, whose daughter, Raegan, was a four-year starter and the only graduate from the program last May. “She’s going to play basketball at Franciscan University of Steubenville.”
She finished her career as the Red Riders’ all-time leading scorer.
“One of my main goals is to increase the participation in girls’ basketball and make the program competitive again,” he continued. “With the four starters returning, hopefully we can get some things happening.”
Stead is a Weirton native, the son of Raymond and Marilyn Stead, graduated from Weir High in 1987 after a stellar career with the Red Rider football team.
He also played basketball and participated on the Weir High track team.
He earned a football scholarship to West Virginia University and was a Mountaineer from 1987-1991. He earned his bachelor of arts degree in liberal arts in 1991 and began a career in law enforcement.
He was with the West Virginia State Police from 1992-94 when he became a rookie patrolman with the Weirton Police Department. In the past 21 years, Stead has worked his way through the ranks and now serves as captain.
It wasn’t long after he and Weirton-native Andrea Fritch were married that Stead got the itch to get into coaching.
Wayne Neeley appointed Stead to the football coaching staff at Weir High, where he was an assistant in 1995 and 1996.
His two daughters, Reagan and Bailey, came along and Stead took a break from coaching, but he got back into it in a big way in 2009. In that year, Stead went back on the football staff as a defensive line coach and also took the head girls basketball coaching job at Weir Middle School, where he served for two years.
He moved up to Bill Smith’s staff at Weir High in 2011 when Reagan was a freshman.
Stead coached the freshman and junior varsity girls teams for two years and has been the varsity assistant under Smith the past two girls basketball seasons.
On top of that, Stead has been the head boys track coach at Weir High the past three years and became a substitute teacher in the Hancock County school system in 2009.