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Riverheads' Robert Casto retiring


Leland McCray
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Official: Robert Casto has informed Riverheads High School that he will retire from teaching at the end of this school year and from Coaching Football after 26 years. He ends with a 261-59 record at RHS including 9 State Championships.

Riverheads will carry an ongoing streak of 50 consecutive wins (Best active streak in the nation) and 6 consecutive State Championships (VHSL Record).

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Just now, UVAObserver said:

If he’s still retired August 1st, I’ll believe it.  Seen this song and dance before.

Let's just hope the Augusta County School Board doesn't hire someone from the eastern shore, have him move his wife and children across the state, find out Casto doesn't approve and un-retires, leaving the supposed new coach without a job.

Other than that, things went pretty seamlessly three years ago.

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53 minutes ago, sixcat said:

Let's just hope the Augusta County School Board doesn't hire someone from the eastern shore, have him move his wife and children across the state, find out Casto doesn't approve and un-retires, leaving the supposed new coach without a job.

Other than that, things went pretty seamlessly three years ago.

And the guy they did that to was Thad Wheeler, the son of the great VHSL High School Coach Paul Wheeler, who won state titles at Rustburg and Lafayette, and did well at Va High long before Rustburg and Lafayette.  Thad Wheeler, prior to going to Riverheads and getting screwed over was at Warhill (Williamsburg) and turned that program around from being a bad program to very competitive in a short amount of time.  He took one heck of a challege after the Riverheads mess and took over at Jamestown, and Jamestown is a program that has been in the dumps since its inception in 1997.  Give that man time and he will turn that around also.  Thad is a darn good coach.

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1 hour ago, Red Rabbit said:

This is the same Thad Wheeler that put out NO effort to meet Casto  and failed to show up for the job . Grant your bottom dollar that ain't happening again  !

Revisionist history!!!

 

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3 hours ago, Red Rabbit said:

This is the same Thad Wheeler that put out NO effort to meet Casto  and failed to show up for the job . Grant your bottom dollar that ain't happening again  !

Come on dude.  What they did to that man was wrong, dead wrong.  You just don't do that.  I didn't know the new coach was supposed to go out of his way to "meet Casto."  The classy thing to do for Casto would be to go out of his way to have a huge welcome for Wheeler.  Afterall, throughout history, it's the traveler that is the one welcomed and greeted by the host in normal social interactions literally dating back to Mesopotamian times.

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Internal candidate this time around would be the right move. Not privy to any of the actual details around Coach Wheelers situation. Was it a crappy situation to put anyone into? Sure but as discussed as being rumored at that time, the assistants bailed due to the amount of change that was suggested. No one has to believe that was the case but I don’t think you would ask one of the more successful defensive coordinators to take the offense because he wanted to run a different scheme on D. If you do then you could expect him to decide to go somewhere else. I don’t fault Coach Wheeler for wanting to run the program the way he wanted but you also can’t fault any assistant for choosing not to stay due to the changes. Casto coming back and the assistants staying had all to do with the train continuing on in the same manner it had been. Again no one has to agree with it or like it but objectively no one wants to work within a system that doesn’t suit your particular talent. I choose to believe that is the case and that given a complete staff of his own choosing, Coach Wheeler would have been successful as he has shown. 

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43 minutes ago, RedPrideNation said:

Internal candidate this time around would be the right move. Not privy to any of the actual details around Coach Wheelers situation. Was it a crappy situation to put anyone into? Sure but as discussed as being rumored at that time, the assistants bailed due to the amount of change that was suggested. No one has to believe that was the case but I don’t think you would ask one of the more successful defensive coordinators to take the offense because he wanted to run a different scheme on D. If you do then you could expect him to decide to go somewhere else. I don’t fault Coach Wheeler for wanting to run the program the way he wanted but you also can’t fault any assistant for choosing not to stay due to the changes. Casto coming back and the assistants staying had all to do with the train continuing on in the same manner it had been. Again no one has to agree with it or like it but objectively no one wants to work within a system that doesn’t suit your particular talent. I choose to believe that is the case and that given a complete staff of his own choosing, Coach Wheeler would have been successful as he has shown. 

If this is factual, it screams of piss-poor leadership. If those "issues" are important enough to the school system to get rid of a coach a week after hiring him, those questions should have been addressed in the interview process prior to hiring anyone.

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I would agree and I think that there was not enough discussion initially to hash these things out. Pretty sure the first meeting with the assistants was when it all blew up over the new direction and within a few days the implosion occurred. I hated it when it happened but again I understand not wanting to continue on if you aren’t bought into the new direction. 

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21 minutes ago, RedPrideNation said:

I would agree and I think that there was not enough discussion initially to hash these things out. Pretty sure the first meeting with the assistants was when it all blew up over the new direction and within a few days the implosion occurred. I hated it when it happened but again I understand not wanting to continue on if you aren’t bought into the new direction. 

My wife and I have both been involved in Boards in some form or fashion for 20 years. It's invariably a mixed bag. I can see where certain members of a school board wouldn't understand how these questions could be so important to any coaching hire. With that said, the AD and principal should have been involved from the outset and if they weren't, that's another glaring weakness in the Augusta County School Board. That is, of course, assuming the AD and principal understand the importance of these questions prior to making a hiring decision. 

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16 hours ago, Red Rabbit said:

This is the same Thad Wheeler that put out NO effort to meet Casto  and failed to show up for the job . Grant your bottom dollar that ain't happening again  !

I didn’t realize a successor had to meet his predecessor. 
 

Wheeler got ripped off. 

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Meeting Casto should never have been a requirement or even mentioned. If Casto retired, he should have ate his enormously artificially inflated pride, got behind the new hire or complete cut ties with the situation.

A new coach needs to distance himself from the old situation, set his standards and principles at the start and build from there. If no one gets on board then Riverheads got exactly what it deserves, a situation with no coach. 

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It should be a little easier with  Casto completely retiring and not being in building.  I feel they have an internal candidate who I assumed they have been quietly prepping and you will see minimal changes in process......results on other hand may be different.  His DC leaving will be huge also.....he is in total charge of defense

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37 minutes ago, sixcat said:

 I can see where certain members of a school board wouldn't understand how these questions could be so important to any coaching hire. With that said, the AD and principal should have been involved from the outset and if they weren't, that's another glaring weakness in the Augusta County School Board. 

This one hits close to home currently.

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56 minutes ago, BearsFan88 said:

I didn’t realize a successor had to meet his predecessor. 
 

Wheeler got ripped off. 

I didn't realize that the new coach had to have any approval from the assistants in what he wanted to do with the program.  Had that been the case, the guys who were there should have applied for the job.  Coach Wheeler might have wanted to see what had been successful before and asked the assistants what they were "comfortable" with, but in the end, they didn't apply for the job.  I totally agree with Bearsfan88.  

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Not arguing with anyone over whether the coach needs to meet with the outgoing coach. Everyone thinks that was a deal breaker and I am pretty sure it had everything to do with the assistants not wanting to change directions. That is certainly up to them to make that decision. I also think the timing of the hiring versus the follow up with the leftover staff left a lot to be desired. 
 

As for the snarky comments about Coach Casto, opinions are just that and everyone is entitled. I would venture to say that most people that have been around him much including competitors would agree he is a solid coach and person. 

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24 minutes ago, RedPrideNation said:

As for the snarky comments about Coach Casto, opinions are just that and everyone is entitled. I would venture to say that most people that have been around him much including competitors would agree he is a solid coach and person. 

For the record, I'm not suggesting anything toward coach Casto. He likely had nothing to do with the entire situation other than to retire. I value Mark Dixon's opinion, and he has a very high one of coach Casto! That's good enough for me.

From my 30-mile view, those with decision making power within Augusta County School Board failed to do their due diligence. 

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46 minutes ago, sixcat said:

For the record, I'm not suggesting anything toward coach Casto. He likely had nothing to do with the entire situation other than to retire. I value Mark Dixon's opinion, and he has a very high one of coach Casto! That's good enough for me.

From my 30-mile view, those with decision making power within Augusta County School Board failed to do their due diligence. 

For what its worth the Wheeler deal happened under the principle and AD who are long gone ! Good riddins ! The new coach should slide in  and there should be little change in the program and the success of the team . Seven in a row sounds good to me !

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This isn't Salem replacing Stephen Magenbauer. This is Giles replacing Steve Ragsdale.  You have two ultra-successful programs where an "antiquated" offensive scheme is synonymous with the teams' very identities, which makes it virtually impossible to replace a legendary coach with an outsider.  

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On 1/4/2022 at 2:48 PM, Leland McCray said:

Official: Robert Casto has informed Riverheads High School that he will retire from teaching at the end of this school year and from Coaching Football after 26 years. He ends with a 261-59 record at RHS including 9 State Championships.

Riverheads will carry an ongoing streak of 50 consecutive wins (Best active streak in the nation) and 6 consecutive State Championships (VHSL Record).

He was obviously forced to retire the guy only won 9 State championships in 26 years that's terrible 😆

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Why would he retire with just 26 years teaching experience????  VRS requires 30 years experience for full retirement benefits..  Is he going somewhere else to Coach???  Very odd to step away at this time.

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