Auburn High hires national volleyball coach of the year

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Auburn High hires national volleyball coach of the year

Published: May. 15, 2024, 10:52 a.m.

3–4 minutes

Brian Wheatley has been hired as the new head volleyball coach at Auburn High School. Wheatley, an Auburn University graduate, led Venice, Fla., High School to six state championships in his 30-year coaching career.Contributed

Auburn High School has hired Brian Wheatley to be its new volleyball coach, according to a news release from the school system. Wheatley is the American Volleyball Coaches Association’s current National Coach of the Year.

Wheatley will be coming from Venice (Fla.) High School where he coached for 30 years. He started at Venice, a city of 27,000 just south of Sarasota on the Gulf Coast, after graduating from Auburn University in 1994. He led Venice to the playoffs in 29 of his 30 seasons. Venice has been to the state playoffs final four 13 times with six state championships. Ten of his teams have finished in the national top 20.

The coach has produced 97 players who have signed college scholarships and more than 20 have become volleyball coaches. In 2023, MaxPreps named Venice one of the Top 100 Volleyball Dynasties in America.

Wheatley has been named Florida Coach of the Year four times and was Coach of the Year for all sports in the state in 2022. He is a member of the USA Volleyball Hall of Fame, the Florida High School Athletic Association Hall of Fame and the Venice Sports Hall of Fame.

For the past two summers, he has been selected to coach college players internationally in a Global Challenge tour in Europe. He is a coach with USA Volleyball as a National Team Development Program coach, developing talent in the Olympic pipeline with some of the top college coaches in America.

“Auburn felt like the right place at the right time,” Wheatley said in the release. “I don’t think there is another high school in the country that I would have moved to besides Auburn High School. I love Venice High School. Venice has been great to my family. It is a wonderful community and a top-notch school system, but ever since I transferred to Auburn University as an undergraduate, Auburn has felt like home.

“My wife and I have dear friends in Auburn. There are churches we love in Auburn. Our daughter just graduated from Auburn University and our son is there currently. We just love the Auburn Community. It’s a cliché but we believe in Auburn and love it.

“Auburn City Schools have a reputation of academic and athletic excellence and they have shown they are willing to do what it takes to compete at the highest levels, so we are excited to come immerse ourselves here and build a program that reflects the greatness of Auburn.”

Wheatley played volleyball at Long Beach State University and San Jose State University in California, and he was an undergraduate assistant at Auburn University under coach Liz Bitzer Underwood. It was at Auburn University where Wheatley met his wife, Lisa, who has had a distinguished career as an Elementary School principal in the Sarasota County Florida School System.

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