Meet Viera High head football coach Tony Gulla

His plan was to "coach the quarterback, maybe help call a couple plays and be home for dinner at 5:30."

Tony Gulla's expectation for his coaching career was that it was winding down. He had joined the staff at Viera High in the spring of 2023, just a few miles from his house, and he "was just going to coach a position and ease off into the sunset, I guess you could say."

Then, the hazing video that temporarily derailed the Hawks football program made its way online in August, days before the team was to open its regular season. Head coach Shane Staples was suspended indefinitely following the discovery of the video that depicted players simulating lude acts, cheered by others in the locker room.

Viera officials asked Gulla to take over on an interim basis, and he accepted as the only staff member with a head coaching background. He took over the position full-time in the winter.

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His career on the sidelines spans almost four decades, Gulla having served as a head coach at two schools in Massachusetts and worked several assistant coaching jobs in Florida. He was passing game coordinator for FHSAA Class 8A state champion Dr. Phillips in 2017, has worked at both Palm Bay and Heritage, and he's also coached weight training and worked with at-risk youth.

He also brought something unique to the Viera job: an ability to command a strict line for behavior while simultaneously holding solid relationships with high school-age players.

"Over 38 years of coaching, I've been able to adapt to the kids, because they've changed through the years," he said. "I was still able to keep some of that old-school discipline, too. You get a little bit of both."

And his secret to walking that line?

"Experience. Some coaches don't adapt, and they fall off."

The key to making a smooth transition on the field was not adapting too much in the style of play.

"I didn't change any of the system that was in place. Coach (Christian) Fuller was the defensive coordinator. He stayed. I took over the offense that had been in place the last few years, added a few wrinkles, but we didn't change much. There really was a seamless transition for the Xs and Os."

Suspension kept the team out of competition for Week 1. When the Hawks eventually returned to action, they squandered a halftime lead at Satellite High in Week 2 to start 0-1 and then were blown out by Rockledge the next Friday, 59-21.

To add to the pressure of the August controversy, that sent the Viera High team into its game against Melbourne Central Catholic on a 15-game losing streak, having been 0-10 in 2022. Nevertheless, the Hawks exploded on MCC for a 53-7 win, and they went on to a 5-4 season and nearly qualified for the playoffs.

"The kids were great last year, (despite being) under a microscope. After the Rockledge game, the kids could have fallen apart," Gulla said. "It was a credit to them, and it was a credit to my assistants that we rallied."

Communication and expectations

Viera administrators demanded a change in behavior. Along with his experience and mix of old school discipline with strong player relationships, Gulla had something else that may have made him a natural pick for the job: his weekday job is as campus monitor.

"It's tough to police any team, so you have a plan in place, and you also rely on your team leaders. With the new setup, we definitely have internal team leadership in place. We're very adamant — our administration is — very adamant about locker room supervision."

While not much changed in game strategy, having those team leaders changed things dramatically off the field. Gulla had the players elect captains. Then the coaches selected others to be part of a leadership committee, two from each grade in school.

"We met with them once a week, and they knew that they could come to us and let us know exactly what was going on, the pulse of the team," he said. "The captains understood they were the captains and the leaders. Those were two things we did immediately last year."

Expectations were communicated to everybody.

"I've talked to the parents, and I've talked to the kids. You're going to act appropriately on campus, on the football field, in the locker room, in the community, and if they don't do that, the consequences are going to be swift and harsh."

Simultaneously, it was evident he had a camaraderie with his players, both through making the game fun and by allowing them to joke with him about things such as that accent that comes from growing up somewhere like Watertown, Mass.

His promise of "swift and harsh" consequences doesn't actually come out with a hard "r," and they let him hear about it, even though he knows they've come to respect the rule.

"The kids make fun of me when I say it, because I say '"'hahhhsh,' but they know it, and they repeat it. While saying that — and I say it with parents, too — everything's on an individual basis. Some kids need to be handled differently. I've been coaching 38 years, and, you want to know something? I've never kicked a kid off a team. They've removed themselves, or they been removed. As (longtime Alabama coach) Nick Saban said, if you kick a kid off a team, where are they going to go? You didn't help them. That's how I've always felt."

A fresh feeling

Gulla's rise to the top job wasn't just a restart for the program; it brought a new outlook to the guy who had been in that winding-down stage.

"After a few weeks, I felt rejuvenated," he said.

This spring, he has a team with 17 seniors but a small junior class, a total of 70 kids out for practices, heavy on the ninth- and 10th-graders. He expects around 100 when official preseason practice starts in the fall.

Some of the top offensive players from last season won't be among them, however. While the defense returns nearly intact and the offensive line does as well, the skill players on the offense will be young.

Gulla and his staff will deal with it. If he can't run the pass-happy offense he wants to run with veterans, he will adapt. Four decades of coaching leads through many approaches to the game.

"We ran wishbone when I started in 1986. We would go to to West Point and study that. I worked two years down in Boca (Raton) for a wing-T guy, so I've worked in that system," he said. "I've been a spread guy for a long time, since my days at Olympia. I had (NFL free agent) Trevor Siemian as a quarterback. What I've learned is being able to adapt the offense to the personnel.

"Down the road, we can get back to what we really want to do, which is throw the ball around 37, 40 times a game. This spring, we're not throwing it much."

Adapting, of course, is easier to do when rejuvenated. On a recent Saturday, he found himself walking out the front door of the home where he is — now — not quite ready to enjoy retirement, his wife asking where he was headed. He told her he was going to watch youth football, the future of the Viera Hawks.

"She knows me," he said. "My kids are grown and out of the house, so I don't have anything to do. I don't golf; I don't fish. I'm not your typical Florida guy. All I've done my whole life is coach football."

This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Tony Gulla takes over as Viera High School football coach