Lions ready to pounce in inaugural season on the gridiron
Asheville Christian Academy launches football program
Fred McCormick
The Valley Echo
February 8, 2021
The ACA Lions football team enters its inaugural season with Dr. Rick Spurling at the helm. Photo by Fred McCormick
In the 63-year history of Asheville Christian Academy, which moved from Haw Creek to its current home in Swannanoa in 2003, the private school’s athletic program has cultivated a winning tradition. The Lions have amassed 34 individual and team state championships from the basketball and volleyball courts to the cross country trails.
A new chapter in the storied history of ACA sports is now being written on the gridiron, where the Lions will buckle their chin straps, Saturday, Feb. 20, for the first football game in school history.
The program will enter its first official contest against the Tennessee Silverbacks in Johnson City to open the inaugural season led by head coach Dr. Rick Spurling. While the seven-game season will mark a new era for ACA Athletics, the coaches and players are not only familiar with one another, but building on recent success as the Asheville Saints.
The school partnered with the Saints organization, a nonprofit program that allowed student-athletes from private schools too small to field a team, homeschool and public school to play in the Pioneer Football League. The PFL is a six-member conference that focuses on Christian principles that emphasizes biblical character traits in its athletes. ACA is also debuting its first cheerleading program this year to coincide with the arrival of football.
“Our partnership with the Saints allowed us to offer our students an opportunity to play high school football since we didn’t have a program,” said Joe Johnson, the ACA Athletic Director since 2004. “That first year we had about two or three of our boys playing for the Saints, but by last year our students made up at least two-thirds of the roster.”
ACA prepares for the first season of football in the Swannanoa private school’s 63-year history. Photo by Fred McCormick
The Saints began holding practices at ACA as a result of the alliance, and tapped Spurling to lead the team. The head coach held the same position at Mitchell High School, a rival of Owen, from 1996-98. Spurling, who has coached the sport for a total of 16 seasons, went on to serve as the principal at Mitchell before ultimately retiring as the Mitchell County Schools superintendent.
His relationship with ACA began after he met Head of School Dr. William George.
“I didn’t know what I was going to do after retirement and then I met Bill George,” Spurling said. “We became really good friends and he asked me if I would serve for a year as the interim principal of the upper school while they searched for someone to permanently fill that position.”
Spurling, who is also an adjunct professor at Montreat College and Eastern Tennessee State University, where he played football, was approached by an ACA board member who managed the Saints program.
“As soon as I got there he was already talking to me about football,” Spurling said. “He took me out to lunch a few times, bought me a chicken sandwich at East Village Grille, and I came out the head coach of the Saints.”
The coach wasted no time developing the program, which existed for more than two decades before merging with the new Lions organization.
“ACA really embraced us immediately, they gave us a place to practice, within a year they gave us a stadium to play in and access to their athletic trainer and treated us like part of the school,” Spurling said. “We were like guests there.”
ACA football head coach Dr. Rick Spurling was the head coach at Mitchell High School in from 1996-98. He returned to the sidelines to lead the Asheville Saints four years ago and is now the first head coach of the Lions program. Photo by Fred McCormick
The Saints didn’t have enough players to field a varsity team during Spurling’s first season at the helm, but 35 junior varsity players joined the squad.
“All 35 of those students have stayed with me all three years,” he said. “They ended up being the backbone of this great run we’ve had these past two years.”
The JV Saints won a PFL championship and lost in the title game. The varsity squad went 8-5 the following year before posting a 10-1 record on their way to a championship season in 2019.
“I still smile about that,” Spurling said.
As the coach established a thriving program, interest in football began to grow among ACA student-athletes, according to Johnson, who had entertained conversations about adding the sport to the school’s athletic program since his job interview nearly two decades ago.
“Football is a unique sport,” he said. “Every sport has its own way of addressing a young person’s development, but there are certain things about football that challenges young people in a way that other sports don’t.”
Johnson was eager to establish an ACA football team, but first prioritized strength and conditioning, and sports medicine programs to support the growth of athletics. The school unveiled a 5,000-square-foot fitness facility in 2020.
ACA will host its first football game on Friday, March 20, against the Tennessee Silverbacks out of Johnson City. Photo by Fred McCormick
“I’ve been preparing for football for a number of years, and a lot of that began when we hired our strength and condition director Nick Ficker and sports medicine director Heidi Pieper,” Johnson said. “Part of building an athletic program is making sure you don’t leave out the importance of the lifelong health of athletes. The vast majority don’t go on to play after high school, but they can learn about nutrition and how to be healthy.”
The school began having conversations about merging into an ACA football program a year ago, as the Saints roster swelled with a growing number of athletes from the school.
“Our crowds at the home games last year were unreal,” Spurling said. “And the majority of the people in the stands were ACA students and family. This program is going to bring some excitement to ACA.”
The Lions will play a “very aggressive” style on defense, according to the coach.
“We swarm, put pressure on the quarterback and play extremely hard,” he said. “Offensively, we’re similar. We run the ball downhill, put pressure on the defense and we throw the heck out of the ball.”
The ground game of the Lions is led by Black Mountain’s Jack Jones, who Spurling calls one of the “best backs in the conference.”
“His personality really sets the tone for who we are as a team,” he said of the senior.
The Lions will make their Swannanoa debut, Friday, March 12, when they host the Silverbacks at 7:30 p.m. The contest will be one of three home games hosted at ACA this season.
The winter schedule, which will include a road game against Western Highlands Conference member Avery, was created when the fall season was moved due to COVID-19.
“This has been a weird year to start a football program,” Spurling said. “We had a fall season planned out and ready to go, but just like the rest of the teams in WNC, we had to move it to the winter. But, we’re all just happy to be a part of the football world here in the mountains.”
The Lions will remain in the PFL and won’t compete in the N.C. Independent Schools Athletic Association as a football program, although the rest of ACA’s athletic programs will remain in NCISAA.
Spurling’s WNC football roots are deep, and include a special memory about the crosstown Owen football program.
“My very first coaching experience was at the age of 24, coaching defensive backs against Brad Johnson when he played at Owen,” he said.
The Warhorses and Lions are not scheduled to play this season, but Spurling is hopeful the two Swannanoa Valley high school football programs will establish a rivalry.
“I have a lot of respect for Owen, and all of those coaches,” he said. “We’d love to play them one day. I think it would be a natural fit for us to play a non-conference team every year. It would be a lot of fun.”
Johnson, Spurling and the ACA community is optimistic about the future of football for the Lions, but the coach is focused on a successful inaugural season.
“I’m excited for the people of ACA to have football,” he said. “Friday night lights, and all the tradition that comes with that, it’s going to be a special time for these players and fans.”