GICC announces new football, softball coaches

GRAND ISLAND, Neb. (KSNB) - There will soon be two new faces in the Grand Island Central Catholic athletic department.

The school announced Sunday evening that they hired Jeff Ashby as the new head football coach and promoted Maria Tibbetts to head softball coach from her previous role as assistant the last seven years.

Tibbetts has additional experience as the Stinger Softball head coach, Central Select Softball’s founder and head coach, the head of Advanced Youth Travel Team Skill Development and a part-time assistant softball coach at Concordia College.

“I’m very excited for the opportunity grow the Crusader Softball program,” Tibbetts said. “My passion is developing youth softball and basketball players.”

As for Ashby, he’s been coaching football for 33 years, including 31 as a head coach. He divided his time among Polk-Hordville, GIPS, Harvard, Giltner, and most recently Wood River (along with the recently disbanded Wood River-Shelton co-op).

“My goal is to make football a successful sport like all the other sports at GICC,” Ashby said.

GICC Activities Director Dick Ross had glowing remarks about both hires.

“Maria will be a great head coach,” Ross said. “As the assistant, she’s worked well with not only the girls from GICC, but also our co-op schools of Doniphan, Wood River and Heartland Lutheran. We are excited to announce Coach Tibbett’s hire.”

GICC’s future Activities Director Bill Gavers, said he’s excited for what Ashby now brings to the football program.

“We’re excited Coach Ashby is coming to coach our Crusaders; he has a lot of championship-winning experience,” Gavers said. “He’s going to be a great head coach for us. His track record speaks for itself.”

Tibbetts currently serves as assistant girls basketball coach at GICC. Ashby is set to begin working with the Crusaders’ football team this summer.