Newly named Alabama High School Athletic Association Executive Director Heath Harmon said in Montgomery Thursday he’s ready to enforce rules and protect traditions in the age of widespread transfers and NIL deals for high school athletes. (Jimmy Wigfield/Call News)
Newly named AHSAA Executive Director Heath Harmon talks with outgoing director Alvin Briggs after Thursday’s announcement. (Jimmy Wigfield/Call News)
By JIMMY WIGFIELD
MONTGOMERY — Heath Harmon, the man who will direct the metamorphosis of Alabama high school sports during one of its most ground-rattling periods, faces extraordinary demands.
“It’s never easy but right now, with NIL and transfers, there’s a lot of stuff out there coming, boys or girls — some things we probably don’t know about yet,” said UMS-Wright’s Terry Curtis, the winningest high school head football coach of all time in Alabama and the incoming president of the Alabama High School Athletic Association’s Central Board, which selected Harmon as its new executive director on Thursday.
“He’s going to be proactive,” Curtis said. “Everybody says NIL is coming and we don’t want to be surprised. The Super 7, it looks like we’re going to have new sites. There’s talk on classifications. He’s going to have his hands full.”
With NIL deals for teenagers clawing at the state’s borders and players transferring from school to school in unbridled flight, Harmon promised to enforce the rules and protect traditions after being introduced as the AHSAA’s sixth executive director. He will succeed Alvin Briggs beginning in early July.
“I wasn’t looking for easy, I was looking for impact,” said Harmon, 49, who was non-committal on what he may or may not do to embrace or fight rampant transfers and the likelihood of Alabama high school players earning money off their name, image and likeness.
Currently, 36 state athletic associations allow it — including Florida, Tennessee and Georgia and the vast majority of SEC states — and 39 state legislatures have either passed, proposed or plan to propose NIL laws.
In Alabama, state Rep. Jeremy Gray (D-Opelika) introduced a bill late last year supporting NIL in one of only two Deep South states to have so far banned it; Mississippi is the other.
“I consider myself a transformative leader,” Harmon said. “That doesn’t necessarily mean change. It means building capacity with everybody. It’s very important that we determine what our core purpose is.”
Harmon, a former football coach who has 27 years in education and is currently Oxford High School’s principal, will assume the directorship of Alabama high school sports in what is probably the most consequential moment for its future survival since Herman “Bubba” Scott, who served the longest as executive director at 25 years, handled integration early in his tenure in the late 1960s.
“That was the toughest time because of integration,” said Steve Savarese, one of three former AHSAA executive directors who attended Thursday’s announcement. “He was able to bring the association together. Without his leadership in 1968, we wouldn’t be where we are today.”
Where high school sports in Alabama will be in five or 10 years is unimaginable but Savarese said he is confident Harmon can successfully manage what is to come.
“I have total confidence in the central board of control in their choice,” Savarese said. “They would not choose anybody who could not take this association to the next level.”
Harmon said leadership in the new, more financially centered landscape of high school athletics, which has bled from the collegiate sphere, “is going to take stamina and courage” and he hopes he will shape it for years to come.
“I knew it was going to be very rewarding and also very challenging,” Harmon said of his new position of authority. “I understand it, I feel the significance of it. That’s what drew me to this job. … I didn’t take this job to take another one. If I’m effective — and I think I will be — then I’ll be here for a while. I’ve got a lot of gas left in the tank. I want people to say I was effective and protected what needed to be protected and allowed our association to evolve.”
Harmon didn’t say if he supports or opposes NIL deals for high school athletes but is keenly aware many people in his conservative state are cautious to accept major change.
“I need to see where we are and have a solid plan but not act so quickly as to be reckless,” he said. “I want to feel things out. We don’t want to do anything to hurt our core purpose.”
Curtis feels it will be advantageous for the AHSAA to be deliberate in governing NIL.
“My thought process is it’s going to come but I hope Alabama is 50th,” Curtis said. “It’s a good thing maybe that we haven’t gotten it yet. It’s so new, we can see what works and what doesn’t work in other states. It will help us in what we do to watch other states and talk to them. Most of the plans are pretty much modeled the same way. Unlike in college, we’ve got to have something controllable.”
Harmon said maintaining the purity of high school athletics is “a huge priority.”
“We’ve got to protect what we have,” he said. “We’ve got to look at our traditions — that’s where I begin when I think about my entrance into the position. … That’s always a challenge. We’ve got to have an eye to the future too and we can do that without running roughshod over tradition.”
Harmon was asked what he will do about a general feeling that “certain schools get away with things” and replied: “If we have a rule, we’re going to enforce that rule. If you want to change it, there’s a process for that.”
Harmon was approved as the new executive director on Thursday in a special meeting of the AHSAA’s Central Board. Briggs will retire on Sept. 1 after serving since 2021.
Curtis said Harmon emerged as the clear choice over former Wichita State athletic director Darron Boatwright after a 3½-hour meeting in which both were interviewed. Boatwright was fired by WSU two years ago and was slow to react to NIL, among other issues, media reports in Kansas said.
“He had a great interview,” Curtis said of Harmon. “He answered the tough questions, he showed a lot of energy and passion and his work ethic is undeniable.”
Harmon was a head coach for 12 years at Cordova, Munford, Andalusia and White Plains, going 52-74 with one winning season at Andalusia (11-2 in 2007).
“His being from Alabama and being a high school coach at several places, that factored in,” Curtis said.
Harmon graduated from Munford and has served as an English and history teacher, coach, athletic director and principal.
“Coaching and playing in the state of Alabama prepares you for understanding the impact of athletics,” he said. “It’s a laboratory for life.”
Harmon earned a bachelor’s degree in secondary education, English and history from Jacksonville State, a master’s degree in secondary education, English and educational leadership from the University of Alabama, an educational specialist degree from UA and is a graduate of the 2023 Alabama Superintendents Leadership Academy.
Harmon said he prayerfully sought and accepted his new job and understands its ramifications.
“I feel the weight of it,” he said. “When you get that call, it’s unreal exhilaration. Then you hang up and it’s, ‘Oh, wow.’”
