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FOOTBALL: Boyd steps down as football coach at Waterford Our Lady of the Lakes after 46 years holding the reins
WATERFORD – The Godfather of high school football in Waterford is calling it quits.
Waterford Our Lady of the Lakes coaching legend Mike Boyd announced his retirement Thursday following 46 years on the job and practically personally turning the Lakers athletic program into a statewide small-school juggernaut.
Boyd, who in recent months had stepped down as the school’s athletic director after a 30-year stint, accumulated 352 wins, third-most in MHSAA history, during his career on the sidelines steering the Lakers’ ship. On three separate occasions, he took his team into the state finals, bringing home his only state title in 2002 when the Lakers powered past Gaylord St. Mary’s 13-10 in overtime.
This past fall in his last season wearing the headphones, he led WOLL to a 9-3 record and his 15th district championship.
Coaching in a city where the public schools’ football teams have languished as basement-dwellers seemingly forever, Boyd thrived at the tiny private Catholic school off Dixie Highway, where he was also an accomplished softball and boys basketball coach. Just like in football, he is a Hall of Fame inductee as a skipper in the softball dugout, having coached WOLL to seven state crowns on the diamond between 1983 and 2004. His 1993 Lakers’ hoops squad made a run into the Class D final four.
Along with his wife Maureen, Boyd has been spending a lot time in Florida the past couple years, even purchasing a home in Bradenton.
Originally, Boyd had intended on coaching football this fall and beyond, while spending his winter’s down South.
However, this week he had a change of heart and decided he would remain in Florida on a permanent basis.
It didn’t take long for him to hook up with a prep pigskin program at his new home base; Boyd has already been hired as a volunteer assistant at Braden River High School for the upcoming season.
Whoever replaces Boyd at the helm with the Lakers, in addition to having some mighty big shoes to fill, won’t be left with a bare cupboard. Third-year starting quarterback Sal Mastromateo will be a junior next season and one of the top signal-callers in the Catholic League. Mastromateo’s protection up front will be provided by Brandon Keen, a 6-foot-6, 295-pound road-grader in the trenches that will be a senior in the fall and is being recruiting by Division I colleges.
