Estancia names ‘Co’ athletic directors
Mike Bargas and Nate Goellrich have new titles at Estancia High. The two will continue to coach at the school, Bargas football and Goellrich baseball, but they added a new duty that they will share.
Bargas and Goellrich are the new co-athletic directors at Estancia, said Dave Martinez, the assistant principal at the school, on Tuesday. Bargas and Goellrich haven’t decided which sports to split up during their first year as athletic directors. They won’t be referred to as the boys’ AD or girls’ AD. Those titles used to belong to the school’s former athletic directors, Tim Parsel and Jessica Perry.
“The school has elected to not assign one as the [boys’] athletic director and [girls’] athletic director,” Martinez said via email. “Rather, each will be assigned specific [boys’ and girls’] sports to fall under their respective responsibilities, which is in the process of being finalized.”
Bargas and Goellrich have time to work out the sports and scheduling. If they need help, Parsel will be around to guide them. Parsel, who retired last school year, will serve as a consultant during the transition.
Bargas and Goellrich, who will continue to teach health education and physical education, respectively, at Estancia, know Parsel well. Parsel hired the two when they came to Estancia to become head coaches for the first time. Bargas left his assistant post at Newport Harbor to become Estancia’s football coach in 2007, and Goellrich left cross-town rival Costa Mesa to take over Estancia’s baseball program in 2012.
“I’ve always had a nice rapport with Tim. He was my freshman football coach at Newport Harbor [in 1986],” Bargas said. “This is another step up and I want to raise the bar a little more being the AD.
“[Parsel] is going to mentor us. I’m going to be OK with most of the stuff, but dealing with the CIF [Southern Section] I’m going to be a sponge around him. He’s got the experience.”
Goellrich, 29, will have Parsel and Steve Hiskey to go to for advice. The latter is Goellrich’s former baseball coach at Brea Olinda, where Hiskey was also the athletic director.
In the last four seasons, Hiskey has been an assistant under Goellrich at Estancia. The Eagles won 53 games during the stretch, the program’s best run. The Eagles’ top season under Goellrich came in his first year in 2012, when the team finished one game out of first place in the Orange Coast League.
“It’s something I’ve always wanted to do,” Goellrich said, referring to overseeing an athletic program. “You just don’t get to be an AD right away. I’ve always wanted to help and be involved with athletics. [Parsel] knew he was going to step down [as the AD in the spring], and he said, ‘You’d be perfect for this.’ We talked about what goes on. I know I’m ready for it. Jessica and Tim had done a great job. We want to grow and build on that.”
Bargas, 43, has been around Estancia longer than Goellrich, and he has had a son, Seth, go through the school.
Bargas is entering his ninth season in charge of the Eagles, leading his football team to three undefeated Orange Coast League titles in the last five years. Bargas is also the first football coach at Estancia to guide the program to the semifinals of the CIF Southern Section playoffs, doing so in 2011.
How his new role as co-athletic director will affect his job as the football coach remains to be seen. The Eagles open training camp on Monday.
“During football I’m going to be busy and Nate will take on more of a responsibility role of going to games, and during his baseball season in the spring, I’ll be doing more of that to help him,” Bargas said. “One of my advantages is that I’m [at the school] all the time. I have a good pulse on what’s going on and it should make for an easy transition.
“Marykay Jones, our athletic secretary, basically runs the ship. If she wasn’t there, I wouldn’t have applied for the job.”
