Perkins will miss Friday’s game

MARION - Tony Perkins apparently will not be coaching for the Marion Indians when they visit Washington (Iowa) for a non-district football game Friday.

Chris Dyer, superintendent of schools for the Marion Independent School District, said that he 'can't comment on personnel matters,” but said, 'The football team will be led (Friday) by the current coaching staff.”

That 'current staff” - according to Athletics Director Corby Laube - consists of six assistants: Pete Messerli, Travis Fuller, Gerald Lowry, Josh Busenbark, Travis Stearns and Henry Martinson.

Nick Perkins, Tony's brother and an assistant, also was not mentioned among those coaching this week.

Laube did not name an interim head coach.

Neither Dyer nor Laube used the term 'suspension” in referring to Perkins' absence, or what caused it.

Perkins could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Laube said Perkins' absence, 'as of now, I think is just for this week. But that's yet to be discussed.”

The Marion program is suffering through a rough stretch. The Indians fell to Mount Vernon, 37-14, in their opener last Saturday, their ninth consecutive loss.

Perkins is in his 16th season at Marion, his alma mater, and owns a 104-52 mark there. He needs one win to tie Les Hipple for the most wins by a Marion football coach.

He previously coached at MOC-Floyd Valley and is 159-98 in 27 years overall.

'It all goes in cycles,” Perkins said before the season about the Indians' downturn in 2014. 'We went 1-8 last year and we didn't do anything than we did different than when we were 9-0.

'There's years you're up, there are years you are going to be average and hopefully, very rarely, you have a team that beats itself like we did last year.”

l Comments: (319) 368-8857; jeff.linder@thegazette.com