By LORI LYONS
Written for the LSWA
Had Frank Monica been just a little bit taller, the history of sports in Louisiana — especially in the River Parishes — might have been changed completely.
As an All-State third baseman at the long-gone Leon Godchaux High School in Reserve, then at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, it was Monica’s dream to be a major league baseball player. But at 5-foot-8, he was too short.
Instead, he became a coach. A really good one, at both the high school and college levels, for more than 50 years, accumulating 284 wins and three state championships at three different schools in football, 114 wins as a baseball coach, and even a couple of wins coaching junior varsity basketball.
Had Monica achieved his original dream, Louisiana probably still would have gained a baseball legend, but hundreds of young boys would not have become men under the tutelage of this stern taskmaster who believed in using sports to teach life lessons — who believed in discipline and work ethic and got generations of athletes to give more than they thought they had to give.
And there might not be a legacy of coaches who learned their craft beside him and went on to become successful coaches — including his own two sons and a nephew.
And the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame might have this deserving member of the 2024 inductee class as the winningest coach in the River Parishes and one of the most successful coaches in the state. He is part of the 12-member Class of 2024 to be honored June 20-22 in Natchitoches. For participation opportunities, visit LaSportsHall.com or call 318-238-4255.
“My first reaction was, my God. I’m very humble,” the 71-year-old Monica said. “I didn’t feel like I belonged with that cast of people. It’s quite an honor. It’s the ultimate honor to cap off a career. That was the furthest thing from my mind when I got into coaching. I never even thought of that as a player or a coach.”
It’s no secret that baseball was Monica’s first love, and he played it passionately at the school everyone called “Reserve.” He also was an All-State guard and linebacker under legendary River Parishes coach Joe Keller, who thought water breaks and working out in shorts were for weaklings.
“He was a man of few words, but he was like Merrill Lynch,” Monica said. “When he spoke, everybody listened to him. Everybody’s stirrup socks had to the be same. Everybody’s sideburns had to be the same.”
It was Louisiana Sports Hall of Famer Ray Didier (2017) who recruited Monica to play baseball for Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, which did not yet have a football team. Didier also was known for his hard-nosed discipline.
“He took it to another level,” Monica said.
Monica went there as a shortstop, but played all four years as the starting third baseman.
“My first game was at the University of Houston,” Monica recalled. “I’m in the lineup as a freshman and I didn’t even make 18 yet. I was a nervous wreck.”
He got over it though, and played 172 games as a Colonel, including the 1970 College Division World Series.
After his professional dreams were dashed, Monica spent the 1971 season as a graduate assistant then returned to the River Parishes to be an assistant under Lou St. Amant at his former archrival, Lutcher.
In 1975, the Bulldogs won a football state championship, then St. Amant left for what was then Northeast Louisiana University (now the University of Louisiana at Monroe). The 26-year-old Monica got a knock on his door in the middle of the night.
“It was two school board members,” Monica recalled. “They said, ‘Congratulations! You’re the new head football coach!’ I said, ‘Get out of here. I don’t want it.’ One thing led to another and I guess they talked me into it.”
Monica spent eight years as the head football and baseball coach at Lutcher, winning the school’s second state football title in 1978 against Haughton.
One of his players was a young football and baseball player named Tim Detillier, who later returned to Lutcher as an assistant under his former coach and now is a St. James Parish School Board member. Detillier would go on to a successful coaching career of his own at Lutcher and Riverside, becoming the winningest coach in the River Parishes until he was surpassed in 2019 — by Monica.
“He’s a great coach,” Detillier said. “Coaches, we all steal and borrow from each other, a little here, a little there. But I probably took more from Frank Monica than anyone else. I think he was a better baseball coach than football coach.
“He taught me so much. It wasn’t the actual coaching thing — what plays you run — it was that he demanded discipline. The only place you could walk on the field was from the on-deck circle to home plate. That’s one of the things I took from him.”
Like his predecessor, Monica left Lutcher for a chance to coach at the college level. He was an assistant at Tulane from 1979-82 under Larry Smith and Vince Gibson, earning a memorable trip to the Liberty Bowl in 1979 and the Hall of Fame Bowl in 1980.
When Gibson was let go in 1982, Monica went back to the River Parishes and high school. He spent one year at Riverside Academy and promptly won the 1983 state title.
The following spring, Jesuit came calling and Monica went there for five years, helping the Blue Jays to four playoff appearances. Then Greg Davis was hired at Tulane and Monica returned to college for six seasons.
“If I had a choice,” Monica said. “I’d take high school. The field is still 100 yards long and 53 yards wide. But in high school, you get right in the middle of it. You sleep in your own bed at night. Recruiting was different then. We only had 12 weekends off a year. Two nights a week I slept on the floor of my office rather than leave at 11 o’clock at night and be back for 6, I loved recruiting because of the people I met — even the ones that didn’t commit — but it was demanding. I was very proud when Tulane went 12-0 (in 1998) because, even though I wasn’t there, 30 of those guys I recruited and most of them were from Louisiana.”
In 1997, Tulane shuffled coaches again and Monica found himself in need of another job. He again returned to the River Parishes, to St. Charles Catholic, where the legend was cemented.
Monica spent three seasons as the Comets baseball coach then took over the football team in 2000. Over the next 21 years, Monica built St. Charles into a powerhouse program, earning 12 state semifinals appearances and six state finals appearances. His Comets won a state title in 2011.
And he did it not with a slew of marquee players who went on to NFL careers, but with a lot of really good high school players who believed in Monica’s work ethic. Only a handful made it to the college level, including running back Mandel Eugene and kicker Casey Roussel at Tulane, and Tyrell Fenroy at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.
“They weren’t the biggest guys,” Monica said. “They were just a bunch of good guys. They’re successful people. You go to weddings and see some of your former players and they’re doing extremely well — you wonder if you had something to do with that.”
The move to LaPlace also gave Monica a chance to make up for lost time with wife, Nancy, his daughters, Gina and Katie, and sons Nick and Ty, who played for their dad.
“It was difficult,” said Nick. “He holds everybody accountable, but it felt like he held his kids to an even higher expectation. And then, of course, whatever he didn’t get off his chest on the field he was going to get off his chest at home.”
Said Ty: “Playing for my dad was a challenge at first and took some getting used to. Separating the player/coach relationship from the father/son was something that we had to adjust to. That experience only helped me in my career coaching my own kids. Coaching with him for 20 years, learning the game of football, was just a small fraction of the things he taught me about myself and how to challenge players.”
Despite their father’s admonitions, both sons followed their father’s path. Nick is the head football coach at Archbishop Rummel High School in Metairie and Ty spent 20 seasons as his father’s assistant and coached softball at St. Charles Catholic.
“I guess it was in their blood,” said Nancy, Monica’s wife of 45 years, who met her young husband while on a trip from her home in Illinois. “We didn’t want them to (go into coaching), but they’ve been successful, so I guess it was a good move.”
Another family member on the sidelines with Monica was his nephew, Wayne Stein, who succeeded his uncle when he finally retired in 2021. Obviously, there’s something in the genes as Stein has led the Comets baseball team to back-to-back state championships in 2022 and 2023 and another trip to the state finals in 2024 along with back-to-back football state championships in 2021 and 2022.
“Usually you leave and let the guy that comes in next screw it up,” Stein said. “I think I felt like I had a little piece of our success so I was more driven to continue what we had built. I couldn’t have been more blessed to have spent the 17 years I spent underneath him. I got a chance to get a front seat and I really do believe it had a lot to do with the success that I have had as a head coach.“
In 2021, after 51 years of coaching, Monica decided it was time to retire.
“My energy level wasn’t there,” he said. “It was hard to keep up with them. It was a grind. I wanted a little more time to spend with my grandkids.”
Although retired, Monica is by no means sitting still. He enjoys trips to the Fair Grounds Race Track, has a nice crop of vegetables growing in his backyard, and a hunting lease in Mississippi.
And he has not given up coaching by any means. He is a frequent visitor to St. Charles and the field that bears his name, as well as Rummel and Tulane practices. Plus, he and Nancy have 14 grandchildren, several of whom are playing baseball and softball, giving the legend the chance to continue to coach.
“He’s a coach in the stands as well,” Nancy said. “After the game he’ll go correct them — ‘You should have done this, you should have done that.’ Always a coach.”
Monica continues to work the Manning Passing Academy in Thibodaux every summer and, when he does go inside, hosts a regular podcast called “Let’s Be Frank.”
Perhaps Monica found his calling after all.
“I guess I was born for this,” Monica said. “Even in little league, I just love the sports aspect. If I’m driving and I see a kid doing something wrong, holding a bat wrong, I’ve got to stop. It drives my wife crazy. I guess coaching is just in me.”
Lori Lyons is a Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame inductee as the 2023 recipient of the Distinguished Service Award in Sports Journalism.