Murfreesboro Post
MURFREESBORO WEATHER

Siegel girls basketball coach Middleton resigns





Middleton

Middleton

Coaching two major sports over the years finally took its toll on Shawn Middleton, who has resigned as the Siegel girls’ basketball coach.

Middleton will remain the head softball coach for Siegel, which is off to a red-hot start this season.

“It was just time,” Middleton said. “Four years with double responsibilities and fundraising and COVID just got to me.”

Middleton was accustomed to double-duty prior to coming to Siegel. In fact, he was an assistant coach in football, baseball and basketball one year at Smyrna.

“The difference was I could go home after practice,” Middleton said. “I didn’t have parent issues and didn’t have to worry about fundraising.

“I’ve spent the last four years at Nissan Stadium working every Sunday and at every event. The kids were there with me and we had fun, but you do that consistently for 10 hours and you have no personal time or family time. My son is going to be a (football) graduate assistant at MTSU and I want to follow them some.”

Siegel went just 3-17 during this past pandemic season and got down to just seven players at one point.

“I’ve always had 15 or 16 players, whether we were good or not,” Middleton said. “You get to wondering has it passed me by, do the kids want to play for me? I told myself it’s kind of obvious what you need to do.”

Middleton also said it wasn’t fair to either program for him to continue to coach both teams.

“That’s what got me,” he said. “When I evaluated it and was looking that the summer basketball camp stuff coming in, I just knew. I think we can be still playing softball until late May and I’ve got no time to prep my (basketball) team. My assistants are great, but you want to be there.

“Basketball and softball overlap, and I just felt like I was treading water trying to get from one sport to the next. I didn’t think it’s fair to the kids.”

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