Family Ties Link Wake Forest and ULM Staffs
9/13/2013 12:00:00 AM | Football
Sept. 13, 2013
By Emma Lingan, WakeForestSports.com
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. - This Saturday may be the first time Wake Forest meets ULM on the gridiron, but the two teams already have a strong connection on the sidelines.
ULM tight ends coach Jerry McManus is a 1978 Wake Forest graduate whose son, Ryan McManus, is a 2009 Wake Forest graduate and current Demon Deacon graduate assistant coach. This will mark the first time the father and son have coached against one another.
"We haven't been able to talk specific football for the past six months once this game got announced," Ryan said. "It will be nice once this game is over, we can kind of get into in-depth football and schemes and things like that."
Ryan walked on to the Demon Deacon squad in 2005 and went on to see action in 34 games in his career, both at quarterback behind starter Riley Skinner and on special teams. He joined Wake Forest as a graduate assistant coach in 2012 and is in his second year as a member of the coaching staff.
"When I finished playing here and I talked to Coach Grobe about possibly getting into the coaching profession, it's amazing how many guys are like, `Wow, you're an idiot. Go do something else, use your Wake Forest degree'," Ryan said. "But my dad was one of the only guys that was really like, `If you want to do it, I will help you in whatever way you can and I strongly encourage you to do it.'"
Jerry lettered at Wake Forest as a quarterback in 1975 and 1976, starting the first nine games of the 1975 season. He finished his career with 1,045 yards passing and 10 touchdown passes. He began his coaching career as a graduate assistant at Virginia Tech in 1978 and has also coached at Pittsburgh, Tulane, Connecticut, East Carolina, Kent State and New Mexico State. He was an assistant coach at Wake Forest from 1987-95, where he spent time coaching the linebackers, quarterbacks and wide receivers. Among the players that Jerry tutored at Wake Forest was wide receiver Ricky Proehl, who owns the Demon Deacon career records for receiving yards (2,949), receiving touchdowns (25) and single-season receiving yards (1,053 in 1989).
Ryan admires his father not only for his coaching prowess, but also for his ability to balance his commitments to his job and to his family.
"I've had a great role model in how things are done the right way and in a way that you focus 100 percent of your time on your job and doing a good job at that," Ryan said. "But you're still never neglecting your family. I was blessed to have him be able to come home to dinner a lot of times growing up. He made a ton of my football and baseball games in high school. So, I've seen the balance of working your tail off when you're at work but when you're at home you're being a good father."
In his burgeoning coaching career, Ryan frequently looks to his father as an example and hopes to pass on his love of football to his players.
"I want to get my foot in the door and follow in [my father's] footsteps," Ryan said. "He's been such a great example to me of how to handle the coaching profession and seeing how the impact that he's had on some of his players' lives. That's what I want to do and be around the game of football. I think college football is the best sport out there. So to have a career of coaching young men and making them better football players and better people, that's what I want to do. He's been a great example for me has definitely pushed me in that direction of following in his footsteps."
Ryan owes much of his success to his father's support and encouragement; nevertheless, the enticing thought of potentially beating him on Saturday has not escaped his mind.
"There will be some fun jabs at Christmas time when we're all together with the family," Ryan said. "I might make him buy me dinner if we win."
