Follow The Leader
“Follow The Leader”: Hopewell Baseball Head Coach Morgan Singletary
Often times, coaches are almost exclusively identified with that particular sport and team and that’s it.
However, we should all know that there’s A LOT more to that particular individual than coaching sports.
With that in mind and since you the parent entrust your child to spend so much time with them, Hopewell Sports Nation wants you to know more about these coaches. What are their interests away from the playing field? Hobbies? What’s their daily job? Etc.
Being involved in sports is only a minor part of who these people are, and we’d like to highlight these great leaders from Hopewell.
We’re excited to start a series called- “Follow The Leader”.
First up is Hopewell High School Baseball Coach Morgan Singletary.
Coach Singletary took over the Vikings High School baseball program in 2020 and has gone on to win two WPIAL Baseball Championships and made Hopewell a consistent winner.
In a conversation on Tuesday evening, Singletary detailed his history with the sport of baseball prior to arriving at Hopewell.
“I played baseball up through high school and really enjoyed it,” said Singletary. “I wanted to be a teacher and coaching was something that I was interested in getting into. That was on my radar as I went off to college. I went on to California, PA. for college and unfortunately, I had some arm issues during my freshman year. So, I really didn’t play much that year and came back the following year and the problems were still there so that’s pretty much what took me out of playing anymore.”
“Once I was done, I got right into coaching. I helped out with a Legion Team where I was from and after that, my first job was at Shaler. I helped coaching their Junior High team before coming to Hopewell.”
Although baseball was Singletary’s true passion, it wasn’t the only sport that he participated in while growing up.
“I played football, I wrestled for two years of High School, although wrestling was more of a time filler because I am someone that likes to be active. I played hockey when I was younger but stopped that when I went to High School. Football and Baseball were the sports that I played all the way through.”
As we all know, individual sports now a days have almost become year-round commitments for both the players and obviously the coaches. Despite this, Coach Singletary finds time to do other things the majority of which are enjoying being a father and husband.
“The kids keep us pretty busy,” said Singletary. “It’s a lot of fun just watching them do their own activities. I’ve had a lot of fun the past couple years watching them play T-Ball, play soccer, Aurora got into basketball this past year. Along with watching them in sports, it’s also fun watching them go through school. I enjoy seeing and hearing about what they’re learning in school and how much fun they’re having.”
“As a family, when the weather is nice, we’re outside a lot. We’ve gotten into gardening. We have some berry bushes that we’ve had the last couple of years. This year is the first year that we’re going to have a vegetable garden at our house. The kids help me out with that, so it’s fun to do that together. I’ve actually really enjoyed getting into that. My wife and I also run; we’ve run a couple half marathons. Actually, when we first met, we decided to do a full marathon together and spent a lot of time running and training together. That time together helped us bond and really get to know each other.”
When he isn’t coaching baseball or raising his two children (Hayes and Aurora) with his wife Kate, Morgan is a teacher at Hopewell High School.
“Right now, I’m currently teaching secondary math, geometry, pre-algebra, calculus and calc BC class that we currently have at the high school. Prior to that, I was a special education math teacher and worked on that for several years. When I came over to Hopewell I was still Special Ed math teacher. Over the last three years, a math position opened up and I made the change to just teach math. It’s been a lot of fun and I really love teaching math.”
Last thing I got into with Coach Singletary was a fun topic and that’s something he has on his bucket list to eventually do hopefully in the near future.
“There’s a lot of things we’ve talked about, and traveling is on that list,” said Singletary. “Personally, I’d like to learn how to play piano. I’m hoping that one of my kids want to learn so that they can teach me how to play. I’m not sure why but that’s something that I’ve always wanted to do. But right now, we’re just watching the kids grow up and that’s a lot of fun and enjoying the time we have with them.”
