Super Bowl champ returns to coach Marsing football. How he plans to rebuild the Huskies
As soon as Shea McClellin started coaching, he knew he’d return home to Marsing some day.
It turns out, some day is today.
Marsing High School’s most famous graduate accepted an offer last week to rebuild the school’s football program as its head coach. His official hiring is still pending school board approval, Marsing Athletic Director Brian Marshall said. The board next meets Dec. 8.
“I’m naturally drawn there,” McClellin said of his hometown. “It’s just something that’s meant to be.”
The former Super Bowl champion and Boise State star will become Marsing’s eighth coach in the past 10 years. The self-proclaimed “retired old guy” said watching his alma mater struggle for years weighed on him. So when the Huskies’ head coaching position opened again, he jumped at it.
“It’s always: ‘Oh, it’s only Marsing. They are always bad,’ ” the 32-year-old said. “It’s hard for me as an alumni to hear that. It was hard for me as a player, too. We were always everybody’s homecoming game because they wanted a win.
“To see how many coaches they’ve had in the last few years, something they need is consistency. I can give them that consistency.”
A 2007 graduate of Marsing, McClellin signed with Boise State out of high school. The Chicago Bears selected the linebacker/defensive end with the 19th overall pick in 2012. He spent four years with the Bears before joining New England in 2016. He became a national sensation with the Patriots, jumping over the line to block field goals and winning the Super Bowl with the Patriots against the Atlanta Falcons.
He retired in 2018 due to concussion issues, joining the Mountain View High staff that fall. He coached a season as an assistant at Corona Del Mar High in Newport Beach, California, before returning to the Treasure Valley last spring. He then spent this fall as the offensive coordinator at Cole Valley Christian, a 2A Western Idaho Conference rival of Marsing’s.
“He was a natural,” Mountain View coach Judd Benedick said. “There was zero ego. He didn’t come in as, ‘I’m an NFL superstar, a Boise State superstar.’
“He had no interest in that. He didn’t want to be that guy. He just wanted to be one of the guys.”
Marsing stands as McClellin’s first head coaching job. And he inherits a struggling program, one that is 6-57 (.095) in the past eight years and has lost 38 straight conference games. The Huskies last made the playoffs and won a league title in 2012.
McClellin said his first task is improving turnout. Marsing had only three juniors and three sophomores this season, leaving the team with few experienced players heading into next year.
“The coaches they have had are from that older mentality of coaching,” McClellin said. “Nowadays, kids need to be taught differently. I’m relatively young and probably doing the same things those kids are doing, playing Fortnite at the end of the day.”
But he cautioned that his presence and decorated background don’t automatically make the Huskies a contender.
“Just because I played in the NFL and won a Super Bowl, it doesn’t mean we’re going to win all these games,” McClellin said. “I wish I was out playing there with them. But they are the ones that are going to win the games. I’m just out there to guide them.”
McClellin said he will build the program on principles of fun, hard work, sacrifice and commitment, adding that he follows former Boise State coach Chris Petersen’s model.
“Coach Pete didn’t care about wins. He cared about making us great men,” McClellin said. “When you focus on the character aspect of players, all the winning, that falls into place.”
This story was originally published November 16, 2021 at 1:20 PM.
