Ben Woolley hired as Long Branch High School head football coach
Ben Woolley has been hired as the head coach for the Long Branch High School football team, Long Branch athletic director Jason Corley said.
Woolley, the Green Wave’s offensive coordinator/offensive line coach last season, succeeds Chad King. King resigned in late March to become the head coach at Ocean Township High School – his scholastic alma mater. King was the Green Wave’s head coach the last two seasons.
Woolley, who was an assistant coach under both King and legendary former Long Branch head coach Dan George, has been the Green Wave’s head baseball coach the last six seasons.
Long Branch went 14-9 under King with three NJSIAA road playoff wins.
The Green Wave advanced to the NJSIAA Central Group 4 championship game last season, with wins at Jackson Memorial and unbeaten Brick Memorial.
In 2022, Long Branch won a first-round Central Group 4 game at unbeaten Pennsauken.
Long Branch won 152 games, three NJSIAA sectional championships, the 2018 South Group 4 regional title and seven Shore Conference divisional championships during George’s 23 seasons as head coach from 1999-2021.
The Green Wave will compete in Shore Conference Class A North this season with Colts Neck, Marlboro, Middletown South, Red Bank Catholic and Rumson-Fair Haven.
Long Branch’s nondivisional games will be against Jackson Memorial, Holmdel and Red Bank, with the Red Bank game having been scheduled for Week 7 and not on either Thanksgiving or the regular season finale for the first time.
There are nine Shore Conference teams who will have new head coaches this season.
The others are:
Brick (Jay Graber); Freehold Borough (Derek Reichenbecher); Keyport (Charlie Marsh); Shore (Don Klein); St. John Vianney (Bobby Acosta); Middletown South (Marc Tomo); Matawan (Matt Walsh) and Ocean (King).
Graber and Klein were the head coaches at Matawan and Ocean respectively last season.
Reichenbecher was Howell’s head coach in 2012 and 2013.
Acosta was the head coach at Marlboro in 2003 and Monmouth in 2006.
Klein, who is Ocean’s all-time winningest coach, and Tomo are replacing Shore Conference coaching legends in Mark Costantino (Shore) and Steve Antonucci (Middletown South).
Both Costantino and Antonucci, who are two of the 10 coaches who have spent at least part of their career in the Shore Conference with more than 200 wins, resigned this past winter.
This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Shore NJ Football: Ben Woolley is the new Long Branch head coach
