AUSTIN, Texas — A Texas high school football legend is returning to the sidelines in 2024.
Texas High School Hall of Famer Todd Dodge will come out of retirement to coach Lovejoy High School in 2024, pending approval from the Lovejoy ISD Board of Trustees.
Dodge is slated to return to coaching for the first time since 2021, when he retired after serving as head coach for Austin powerhouse Westlake from 2014 to 2021, winning the 6A State Championship in 2019, 2020 and 2021 – his final three seasons guiding the Chaps. Prior to his time at Westlake, Dodge served as head coach at Marble Falls for two seasons, in 2012 and 2013.
Dodge has a career win-loss record of 125-46, a 73% winning percentage. Dodge also spent four and a half seasons as a coach at the college level, three and a half as the head coach at North Texas from 2007 to 2010 and one as the quarterback's coach at the University of Pittsburgh in 2011.
Dodge has won numerous accolades during his time as a high school head coach. Aside from his astounding seven state championships won, he is a three-time national High School Coach of the Year winner, having won in 2003, 2004 and 2021. He is also a five-time State High School Coach of the Year winner, and he was inducted into the Texas High School Football Hall of Fame in 2006.
Assuming Dodge's hire is approved by Lovejoy ISD, he will join a program that is a perennial playoff team that won 12 games in 2023 – an incredible campaign that enabled previous head coach Chris Ross to take a position as the offensive coordinator at Stephen F. Austin University.