Coupeville Sports

Wolf football faced the fog in last year’s meeting with South Whidbey. This fall the Falcons will bring a college coach to town. (Shelli Trumbull photo)

The Falcons nabbed a big Dawg.

Former University of Washington assistant football coach Chris Tormey, who also was a head coach at Nevada and Idaho, has been hired as the new head football coach at South Whidbey High School.

He and his wife, Kellie, had moved to Whidbey Island and she was hired as the communications coordinator for the Oak Harbor School District.

At the time of the move, Tormey was working as the defensive coordinator at Wyoming, a job he has since left.

Tormey replaces Andy Davis and Mark Hodson, who resigned in March.

While Coupeville is leaving the 1A/2A Cascade Conference to join the 1A Olympic League in the fall, the two Whidbey rivals will continue to play and battle for The Bucket.

The two schools are slated to kick off the 2014 season with the Falcons coming to Cow Town in early September.

“I feel hiring Coach Tormey was a great move for South Whidbey,” said Coupeville head football coach Tony Maggio. “He is a great coach and I have got to know him a little bit and have enjoyed talking with him. I look forward to week one!”

Tormey played defensive end and linebacker at the University of Idaho in the late ’70s, before becoming a graduate assistant at Washington in 1980.

He had a brush with the NFL as a player with the Washington Redskins in 1978 and was briefly a teacher/coach at Gonzaga Prep High School.

He has been in the college game ever since, putting in 16 years at the U-Dub, packaged around nine years as a head coach.

Tormey went 49-54 at Idaho (1995-1999) and Nevada (2000-2003).

While at Idaho, he coached his alma mater to a 42-35 win over highly-favored Southern Mississippi in the 1998 Humanitarian Bowl. It was the first-ever bowl game for the Vandals.

During his time at Washington, working under Don James, Tormey was part of the 1991 Husky team that shared a national championship with Miami.