Travis Baxley lands his first head coaching job at Pike Lib

TROY, Ala. (WSFA) - In the span of a couple of weeks Pike Liberal Arts School in Troy’s landed on hiring its second head coach, who will also serve as athletics director. The Patriots tapped Pike Road defensive coordinator Travis Baxley as the guy for the job.

“First head coaching position and it’s exciting,” he said.

Weeks ago, Pike Lib announced the hiring of Hugh Fountain as head football coach and athletics director. Fountain suddenly resigned from the position soon after, opening up the chance for Baxley to land his first head coaching gig.

“The things that happened before I got here, that sort of causes the job to be open to start with, doesn’t really matter to me,” he said. “Things work out the way they should, whether you see it at the time or not.”

Baxley admitted with this being his first head coaching job and first time serving as an athletics director, there are some nerves, but those will subside in due time.

“There’s some butterflies with it, but that’s part of the deal. You don’t get better without stepping out into the abyss,” he said.

As a coach, Baxley comes over from Pike Road. Baxley was part of a coaching staff that helped lead the Patriots in Montgomery County to an AHSAA Class 5A state title last fall. He’s excited to join a winning culture at Pike Lib.

He will also oversee Pike Lib as it transitions from AISA into AHSAA, something that caught his eye when he interviewed for the job.

“When you’re a private school, and this is my first experience with a private school, but I can only imagine, we are competitors here, that if you’re a private school surrounded by public schools that you can’t play that are about the same size school as you, you wonder, ‘Hey, if we could play those schools, we could beat their butt.’ And the public schools, ‘Ah, you’re just private,’ Well we’re fixing to get our chance coming up,” he said.

Baxley mentioning his focus is immediately on the upcoming football season, with the Patriots scheduled to take on Highland Home in just under two months from now.

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