Lifelong Red Devil approved to become school’s head football coach, driven to bring the program back to former glory
By Al Muskewitz
Riverview Sports News
PENNS GROVE – Damian Ware has been through the highs and lows of the Penns Grove football program, both as a player and a coach. The Red Devils are in a downturn right now and he wants to bring them back and now he has that chance.
Ware was installed as the Red Devils’ new head football coach Monday night. He takes over for Marc Maccarone, who stepped down after the final game last season.
It’s an ambitious take for Ware, 48. He’s also the Red Devils’ boys basketball coach and will remain in that position in addition to the football job. Actually, he was coaching that team to a win at rival Pennsville while the board was meeting to approve him for the football job.
He also was an assistant track coach, but will give that up to oversee the strength and conditioning program. He’s hoping his players follow that lead and encourages them to become three-sport athletes.
“I’m a football guy too,” he said. “I’ve been coaching football for over 10 years at Penns Grove, I played football at Penns Grove. I was an all-star player back in the week a few times and a lot of people said I should have played football in college instead of basketball, but I love basketball more so I just played basketball in college. But I’m a football guy as well.”
What else he is is Penns Grove through and through. He played football and basketball there for Al Birch and Steve Kline before going on to play college basketball at FDU in the late 90s (and nearly beating UConn in the NCAA Tournament), and when he returned home served as an assistant for each of the Red Devils’ last three head football coaches – Kemp Carr, John Emel and Maccarone.
“One thing you know about Damian,” athletics director Anwar Golden said, “he is Penns Grove to the core. Nothing comes before the growth of Penns Grove. I’m really excited about working with him.”
The Red Devils had been championship contenders in Group I for years, but they missed the playoffs each of the last two years, bottoming out at 0-9 this past season, their first winless season in recent memory. In the most recent West Jersey Football League reshuffle, they was demoted to the Independence Division after playing in the dynamic Diamond Division since the league’s inception.
“We want to bring the pride back to Penns Grove football,” Ware said. “We were more of a football town than a basketball town and now it’s kind of flipped the other way. I want it to be both, football and basketball, because that’s what we’ve always been.
“We’ve always been a prevalent team in both sports. We’re looking to bring the culture back and bring the pride back to Penns Grove football. That’s part of the reason I wanted to take on the program, to try to bring it back,”
His approach to that will be a “homegrown way.” He said the two biggest factors in bringing them back are the commitment to a youth football program and restoring the culture surrounding the program.
“Without that feeder system it’s tough because kids come into high school without that background, knowledge of playing football or even knowing how to get into a three-point stance,” he said. “We want them to come into high school with some experience.
“We need to get our feeder system back first and foremost, and then change the culture. The pride in football has kind of been lackluster. A lot of guys went to different schools. We’d like to keep our talent here. That’s the No. 1 thing we need to do, keep our talent because we’ve always been one of the best programs because we have some of the best talent around.
“We need to bring the pride back to Penns Grove football, keep the kids here and continue to win like we always have.”
Top photo: Damian Ware (R) talks over a play with Penns Grove head coach Marc Maccarone during a preseason practice last summer. Ware was approved as the Red Devils’ new head coach Monday.
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