The Chattanooga Football Club is moving into the professional ranks with a very familiar face.
Bill Elliott, who has guided CFC to a 79-25-24 record the past seven seasons and has been named the National Premier Soccer League's coach of the year three times, agreed Friday to lead the team for an eighth season and a first with professional players. Last month, the NPSL announced CFC will be among 11 clubs to play an amateur season from May to August next year before vying in the inaugural Founders Cup pro event from August through November.
Elliott also will serve as CFC's general manager in 2019, with current GM Sheldon Grizzle assuming the role of club president. CFC also announced Friday that Peter Fuller, one of the winningest coaches in NAIA history with a 311-115-21 record, will serve as Elliott's associate head coach.
"I'm excited," Elliott said. "I'm going to have new working relationships. I've known Sheldon and I've worked with Peter briefly, so building chemistry with our front office and our coaching staff is going to be the big challenge. I'm looking forward to it."
Elliott's success with CFC includes a trio of 15-win seasons, six NPSL Southeastern Conference titles, four national semifinal appearances and three national final appearances. CFC lost the 2015 NPSL title to the New York Cosmos B 3-2 in extra time before a Finley Stadium crowd of 18,227, the largest audience ever for an amateur club soccer game in this country.
Adding the new role will not be a big adjustment, said Elliott, who was a soccer standout at Hixson High School before going on to play at the University of Tennessee.
"The addition of the general manager title really doesn't change much from what I've been doing," he said. "With most professional clubs, the general manager is the person who identifies talent and negotiates the terms of them playing for the club, which is basically what I've already been doing.
"The top leagues like the MLS have a general manager and a coach, but lower leagues like the USL are shifting towards the head coach and the general manager as a dual role with the president running the business side."
Elliott is also the men's soccer coach at the University of West Florida, where he has guided the Division II program in Pensacola to a 271-122-42 record through 24 seasons with nine Gulf South Conference titles. With NCAA men's soccer a fall sport, Elliott will coach CFC through August before giving the coaching reins to Fuller for the Founders Cup.
Fuller has won two NAIA national championships as a head coach, first with Belhaven (Mississippi) University in 1992 and then with the University of Mobile in 2002, and he has served on the MLS staffs of the Philadelphia Union and the New England Revolution.
"We are blessed to have a coaching staff of this caliber," Grizzle said. "Most clubs around the country would love to have one of these men heading up their team. Both men have had incredible success identifying and cultivating talent, and we are certain that our players will thrive under their leadership.
"Together, they will lead Chattanooga Football Club to a new level."
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6524.