Fields hired as next JCHS football coach

The Patriots are looking to build something, and the first brick has just been laid.

Jay School Board unanimously approved Eddie Fields to be the next Jay County High School football coach during a special session on Monday. (For more on the meeting, see School tour.)

 “I’m very appreciative to the administration all the way across the board from Alex (Griffin) as the AD all the way up to the superintendent,” Fields said. “All those guys have been very helpful along the way and I’m grateful for that. … I can’t wait to get stared and contact the parents and get to know the kids.”

Fields, a graduate of Whitko, takes over for Indiana Football Hall of Famer Grant Zgunda, who retired following the 2024 season in which the Patriots went 3-8. After his time as a Wildcat was over, he played football at Anderson University before he transferred to Purdue Fort Wayne after his career was derailed by injuries.

Fields got his start in coaching as an assistant at the former Fort Wayne Elmhurst before landing the head coaching position at Fort Wayne South Side in 2010. He captained the Archers for three seasons, leading them to 9-21 record with the best season coming in 2011 at 4-7. He was also the baseball coach at South Side and has worked as a wrestling assistant.

Looking for a new start, Fields moved south for the next nine years, serving in a variety of assistant roles at Space Coast in Cocoa, Florida, Brantley County in Nahunta, Georgia, and Hannah Pamplico in Pamplico, South Carolina.

As his son, Bryan, entered high school, Fields returned to Indiana as the coach at Manchester. He led the Squires to a 5-7 season, their best since going 8-2 in 2009. He moved back to Georgia after his teaching position got eliminated at Manchester and he served as an assistant coach at Wayne County this year.

He wanted to bring his family back to Indiana for the remainder of his son’s high school career when he found the job at Jay County.

“As we were looking to come back, the Jay County position became open, as did other positions,” Fields said. “But Jay County all the way was just a great spot that I really felt like I could build a program and meet my personal goals, but also bring my kid in there and be a great experience where he could have great educational opportunities as well as athletics. So, really excited about it from that regard.”

There were a few keys that helped Fields stand out to Jay County Athletics Director Alex Griffin. Among them were the depth of experience and passion he has for football and how that has provided him a different mindset on how to put Jay County into a position to be successful.

“I think his passion and desire (made him stand out),” Griffin said. “I think we was probably, out of all our candidates, the most prepared. … He’s very disciplined and has desires and (new) approaches for our program from weights and nutrition and maximizing our athletes’ potential, figuring out what that is and putting that forward. That was definitely attractive.”

Two more key points that made Fields a desirable candidate to administration was his passion to become a Patriot and the effort and his planned involvement at the youth football level in Jay County.

To the former point, the hiring committee had a candidate they were nearly ready to move forward with in the hiring process during school board’s Feb. 24 meeting. Prior to the meeting, the two parties decided to move forward in different directions due to Jay County wanting someone who specifically wanted to be a Patriot according to Griffin.

To the latter point, Griffin mentioned that Fields already has planned to handwrite letters to elementary school kids to try and get them excited about football, while interacting with youth athletes through other avenues as well.

“We are looking for something to build,” Griffin said. “It’s not an overnight thing. Obviously we want success starting next year, but at the end of the day, we know and we want to push and continue to push building something. That has to start young and grow into what he wants and I think he has a good vision for that.”

Fields and his family currently live in Georgia but will now begin looking to make the move back to the Hoosier state now that he has been officially hired by the Patriots.