WEIRTON – Faith.

Family.

Academics.

Football.

That’s the mantra for new Weirton Madonna head football coach Darrin Hicks.

And, it won’t be just lip service.

“Those are the core values as we go forward,” he said Tuesday after meeting with all freshmen, sophomore and junior males in the high school.

Hicks found out the job was open and began the possible journey with one thing.

“I prayed about it,” he said.

He then talked to his wife, Jennifer, an Oak Glen graduate.

“She was all for it,” Hicks said.

And, so it began.

Although, for Hicks, it began on Oct. 31, 2015, on the bus ride back from Central Connecticut State. He was the offensive coordinator at Robert Morris.

Jennifer sent him a picture of their daughter in her first Halloween costume.

“It really hit me hard about 9 o’clock on the bus ride home, coming across Pennsylvania,” he said. “We were still four hours away from home and I had no chance to be a part of her first Halloween.

“To this day, it still affects me. It really cut deep.

“That really was the beginning of the end. We got in around 1 a.m. and when I got home, obviously, everyone was asleep.

“It really solidified where my priorities needed to be, compared to where they were at that present time.”

Hicks is a 1992 Weir High graduate. He was First-Team Class AAAA All-OVAC as a senior lineman, and was a three-year starter.

He went to Washington & Jefferson, where hs was a two-time All-PAC offensive lineman.

The Presidents’ went 43-6 during his four seasons with two national championship game appearances and four conference titles.

“We had a lot of good candidates for the job and a lot of really good interviews,” Madonna Athletic Director Jon Kendrick said. “We appreciate everyone who had an interest in becoming our new head coach. But, Darrin was the right fit for us at the right time.

“He has a wealth of experience and we believe will fit right in with the Madonna family and will hit the ground running. We are excited to have him on board.”

Hicks and his wife were set up on a blind date in Thousand Oaks, Calif., where he was a coach at Cal Lutheran.

“It’s a crazy story,” he said. “We were both from the same place and had a lot of the same experiences.”

Hicks said Jennifer has been with him from the jump and she welcomed the opportunity at Madonna.

“Faith is what brought me home. Everything in life is built on my faith and belief in God,” he said. “Family is huge for me. I want these young men to really believe in the idea of family. It’s really not about these four years, or five years, it’s about the next 40 years of these young men’s lives.

“One of the most important things for me is to see the guys I’ve coached in the past, 10 or 15 years ago, when I see on Facebook, them holding their child for the first time, or getting married and I see them with their new wife.

“That means more to me than the touchdowns.

“I think all of that works together.”

Hicks started his coaching career in August 1996 as a graduate assistant at Emporia State in Emporia, Kan.

He has been at 10 places in varying coaching aspects in 20 years before being the new Madonna sideline boss.

“I really feel that I have the most unique perspective of a coach, maybe in the country,” said Hicks, who has also coached in Pennsylvania (twice), Texas, South Dakota, New York, Mississippi and North Carolina. “I’ve been at so many places, been around so many people, so many different kids, so many different coordinators, that I don’t know if there’s much that I haven’t seen or been a part of, good, bad or indifferent.

“I would not change anything in my career that has brought me to this point.”

He spent the last two years as offensive coordinator at Robert Morris under head coach John Banaszak, who was the head coach at W&J in Hicks’ senior year. He earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration at W&J and started on his coaching career which, in essence, went full circle.

Hicks also has a simple philosophy on life, considering he is the son of the former Weirton chief of police.

“I want to be as truthful with them as I possibly can,” Hicks said. “I want to be honest. I really would like to be the most honest guy that they ever meet, from a coaching standpoint, and, even in life in general.

“That’s how I was raised, to be honest, to put my cards on the table to everybody.

“I want these young men to feed off of that. I want to build young men of character. I want to build young men who have a good, moral base, and guys who aren’t liars.

“I want players to take responsibility for their actions.

“I want to impart to these young men that honesty is a huge thing. So, when I ask ‘What happened?’ Just be honest with me. Tell me what happened from your perspective. Don’t lie to me. Don’t lie to me about your academics. Tell me the truth so we can build that trust and so I can help.”

Hicks takes over a team that is 4-16 in the last two seasons after going 26-2 with a state championship and a state runner-up finish the previous two years.

“I’ll give these guys everything I have to go to the places they want to go,” he said. “It’s going to be hard work and there is no way around that.

“For me, it’s time to roll up our sleeves and get started.”

Madonna will host a “meet the coach” from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. Friday.