- January 7, 2025
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After Jordan Butler replaced Zach Rigney as Matanzas High School’s athletic director in 2021, he would tell people that he was just riding Rigney’s coattails.
“I really didn’t change a whole lot. I just tried to continue building on what he started,” Butler said.
Now it’s Rigney’s turn to do the same. He’s returning as the Pirates’ AD this semester after Butler stepped down to take a job with Baker’s Sports.
“I think Jordan did a really good job keeping the Ship going in the right direction,” Rigney said. “We’re going to continue to row in the same direction. I want to thank our principal, Ms. (Kristin) Bozeman, for giving me this opportunity.”
Rigney was previously the athletic director at Matanzas for four years, 2017 to 2021. Evidence of the continuity, he said, is that the majority of the coaches he hired are still with the Pirates.
Rigney stepped down at the end of the 2020-21 school year because he was needed at home. He and his wife had two young children with one on the way. They now have four children, ages 2 to 10. Next year, three of their children will be in school, he said.
Rigney returned to Matanzas a year ago as an ESE support facilitator for English. He said he really enjoyed his year back in the classroom, but his heart is in athletics. He played baseball at Atlantic High School in Port Orange, where he graduated in 2006, and continued his baseball career at Capital University in Columbus, Ohio.
Rigney went on to coach Atlantic’s baseball team for two seasons and then became the Sharks’ athletic director for two years before moving to Matanzas.
“I love working with coaches. Some of the best people in the world are coaches,” he said. “I love working with student-athletes, helping them grow off the field as young adults. When you’re a head coach you can impact 15 to 30 student-athletes. But when you’re an AD, you can impact 600 student-athletes.
In his first stint with Matanzas, he said, one of his goals was to remember every Matanzas athlete’s name.
“I don’t know if I got everyone of them, but I got the majority of them,” he said.
