Charleston Daily Mail, Thursday March 20, 2008

WVU Tech names Scott Tinsley head coach

Nitro coach becomes Tech's fifth head coach since 2004

by From staff reports

MONTGOMERY -- West Virginia University Tech has announced the school has hired Nitro's Scott Tinsley to fill its vacant position as head football coach.

Tinsley leaves Nitro after six seasons as head coach and 13 seasons overall. His record as head coach with the Wildcats was 49-22 and included five trips to the Class AAA playoffs. The 2005 Nitro team reached the state title game, where it fell to Morgantown in overtime 27-24.

The new coach of the Golden Bears joined the Nitro staff in 1995 and engineered the offense that enabled former quarterback J.R. House to win the Kennedy Award twice in three seasons. The 1998 Nitro squad won the only state football title in school history.

Tech has had five different football coaches since 2004. The most recent coach, Bill Kehrer, served on an interim basis after the second game of the 2007 season and resigned in January. Prior to Kehrer's stint, Shane Beatty quit the team just two games into his second season on the sidelines.

Tinsley hopes to turn around a program that has won two games in the past three seasons and is struggling to find its identity in the Kentucky-based Mid-South Conference in the NAIA. Tech left the West Virginia Conference and the NCAA Division II ranks after the 2005-06 school year. However, in recent months administrators at the school have indicated that Tech is interested in rejoining the WVC and returning to Division II.

Tinsley also currently serves as the girls basketball and softball coach at Nitro, though his status with those programs has yet to be announced.

The hiring marks a return to college football for Tinsley, who served as the football coach at West Virginia State from 1992-94. His 1992 team went 6-4, the last time a Yellow Jacket team finished with a winning record before 2007's team finished 7-3.