Lowcountry high school coach Dave Adams retiring after more than 30 years
One of the longest tenured coaches in the Lowcountry is hanging it up.
Hilton Head Prep football coach Dave Adams announced Thursday he is retiring after more than 30 years of coaching.
“I call it more of a celebration than retirement because I made this far,” Adams told The Island Packet on Thursday.
Adams said he thought about retiring last year but decided to stick it out. His final season was a challenging one because of the low number of players and injuries.
Hilton Head Prep started out 6-2 before losing its final three games of the season. The Dolphins lost to Williamsburg Academy, 49-15, last week in the first round of the SCISA 2A playoffs.
“Last year, we had a lot of talent, and I didn’t want to walk away when that talent left,” Adams said. “I thought it would be a great challenge to come back with this group. It was the lowest numbers that we had at Prep, and at the first of the year, we were looking at, Were we going to have enough to field a team? But at one point, we were sitting at 6-2 before the injury bug hit us.
“But for us to have the season we had, I was really proud of our guys, and I was glad I came back.”
Adams, 65, said he plans to play more tennis and spend time with his four children who live in the Hilton Head area.
Adams has been a fixture in the Lowcountry. He started at May River Academy in 1977 to coach football and other sports, forging success as the school transitioned into Hilton Head Prep. He left Prep to take a coaching position at Hilton Head Island, where he spent 16 seasons as offensive or defensive coordinator.
After Hilton Head Island, Adams became the head football and athletic director at Bluffton High when the school opened in 2004. He coached football for three years before giving up coaching and concentrating on athletic director duties until 2016, when came back to Hilton Head Prep for his second stint.
“What stands out to me is that I was lucky to spend my whole career basically in the same town,” Adams said. “And wherever I would go, whether a gas station or grocery store, I would see former players. That is the biggest satisfaction of the job.
