Colony head football coach steps down

PALMER — A week or two into the 2014 football season, Brian McIntosh’s 7-year-old son Bridger had a question for him.

“He asked why I wasn’t coaching his team,” McIntosh said. “I didn’t really have a good answer.”

McIntosh, the head coach of the Colony Knights football program for the past five seasons, has stepped down from his position, opting for the opportunity for more time with his wife and two children.

“I wanted to spend more time with the kids. My son just started football,” McIntosh said. “It’s the most difficult decision I’ve ever made in my life. I can’t commit the time required to be the head coach anymore.”

In his five seasons as head coach of the Knights football program, McIntosh led Colony to a pair of Railbelt Conference titles. In 2010, his first year as head coach, McIntosh guided the Knights to a 7-3 overall record and perfect 6-0 mark in conference play. Colony advanced to the state semifinal round. The Knights also won the 2013 Railbelt under McIntosh.

McIntosh, also an assistant with the programs for five seasons before his promotion to head coach, was named the Alaska State Coach of the Year in 2010, and the Railbelt Conference Coach of the Year in 2010 and 2013.

McIntosh said he’s proud of all the accomplishments during his tenure as a head coach and assistant, but his feelings go beyond mere wins and losses.

“The big wins, that’s always fun. But it’s the relationships, how the team bonded,” McIntosh said.

There are seasons, with particular teams, which certainly stand out, he said.

“This group right here, the 2014 season, we made a really good connection, bonded really well,” McIntosh said. “It’s a really good group.”

And there’s the 2010 squad, his first group as a head coach. In part due to battles on and off the field, McIntosh had a special connection with the 2010 squad.

In May of 2010, McIntosh, also a history teacher at CHS, faced a life-altering obstacle. After suffering a focal seizure during a class at Colony High, McIntosh was diagnosed with an anaplastic astrocytoma grade three brain tumor.

“There were a lot of obstacles we had to overcome,” McIntosh said. “We were going through a lot. It brought us really close. That will always be very special.”

Prior to the 2010 season, McIntosh and his wife Stacey flew to Minnesota, where he was a patient at the Mayo Clinic, a world-renowned facility in Rochester. There, surgeons were able to remove about 90 percent of the cancerous mass. Following the surgery, McIntosh went through a rigorous regiment to treat the aggressive form of cancer. That included both radiation and chemotherapy while the Knights were working through the preseason practices in 2010.

McIntosh said the team, in addition to friends and family, really helped him get through a difficult time in his life. In addition to the off-the-field battles, Colony also celebrated an undefeated conference season in 2010, that included the program’s first win over Juneau-Douglas in school history.

“It still talk to a lot of them, once a month, some of them once a week,” McIntosh said of his players from the 2010 squad.

Colony activities director Mike Boyd praised McIntosh’s ability to handle the off-the-field stress, while maintaining a great desire to continue to teach and coach.

“He’s pretty miraculous as far as I’m concerned,” Boyd said of McIntosh. “I won’t even pretend to understand what he’s gone through personally. I think he did a phenomenal job.”

Boyd said he believes the ability to continue to teach and coach helped McIntosh through his health battle.

“I have to believe the game was good for his health. The fact he could still do it certainly gave him a positive attitude,” Boyd said. “I think coaching was probably as much medicine as anything else.”

Boyd said McIntosh also set a great example.

“I don’t think I ever heard him use it as an excuse for anything,” Boyd said. “It shows you, if life deals you a rotten hand, do the best you can do with it.”

McIntosh said his health scare also played into his decision to resign as head coach.

“So far, it’s good,” McIntosh said of his health.

But regardless, it does reinforce his desire to spend time with his family.

McIntosh said he’s happy with his 10 years with the program, and paid tribute to the former head coaches he served as an assistant under, Randy Magner and Jamie Mayo.

“That first year with Randy, and then with Mayo, I learned a lot from them,” McIntosh said.

Overall, Boyd has high praise for McIntosh as a coach and a person.

“He’s got a love for the game, a love for the kids,” Boyd said of McIntosh. “He’s a student of the game, constantly trying to make himself better. The main thing, he wasn’t an old man stuck in a rut. He tried to figure out what they needed to do with the personnel they had, and learned how to do it.”

McIntosh didn’t rule out coaching again in the future, whether it be on the youth football level with his son or even with the Knights program in some capacity.

“I don’t think so,” McIntosh said when asked if he’s done coaching. “Whether coaching my son or helping the coach here, whoever the head coach is.”