Rio Rancho football: Pannoni resigns, Pino to replace him
Apr. 27—Rio Rancho High School both lost its head football coach and hired a new one within a few hours of each other on Wednesday.
Gerry Pannoni told his team on Wednesday morning that he was resigning; the school, moving swiftly, announced the hiring of his offensive coordinator, Nate Pino, as Pannoni's successor by mid-afternoon.
Pannoni, 64, said in a phone interview that he is soon moving back to Virginia to be near his wife, Lisa, who died earlier this month from MSA, or Multiple System Atrophy. She is going to be buried in Virginia, where the couple lived before they relocated to New Mexico.
"I can't mentally be in New Mexico and my wife buried in Virginia and me not be able to visit her," Pannoni said. "We were best friends. ... I'm not the guy that goes and hangs out with the dudes or anything like that. I hung out with my wife."
Pannoni was hired in early February of 2020, about six weeks before the pandemic shut down the spring sports in New Mexico that year.
He coached the Ram football team for two seasons, both in 2021. They were a combined 12-3, including the abbreviated spring season a year ago. Pannoni led Rio Rancho to the Class 6A state title game last November, when the Rams fell to rival Cleveland.
MSA is the same disease that claimed Hall of Fame boys basketball coach Mike Brown last summer.
Pannoni had been coaching the Rams while also caring for his ailing wife since the couple arrived in New Mexico two years ago.
"I have to be near her," Pannoni said.
He added that he is not leaving for another job in Virginia, and does not yet have anything lined up, including a teaching position. He said he will finish the current school year at Rio Rancho High, where he is a physical education teacher.
"That will come in time, I guess. I'll figure that out," Pannoni said of his future plans.
When Heath Ridenour resigned as Cleveland's head football coach in January, the school district named a new coach in Robert Garza the following day.
Rio Rancho didn't even wait that long Wednesday as it selected Pino, 40, a 2000 graduate of Rio Rancho High, to lead one of the state's premier programs.
Pino holds a rare distinction at Rio Rancho: he has coached at his alma mater with every previous Ram head coach except Bill Moon, the first coach, for whom Pino played. Pino later coached with Wilson Holland, Phil Lopez, Mike Worley, David Howes and then Pannoni.
"I'm excited," Pino said. "It's definitely one of the best jobs, if not the best job, in New Mexico. Dave and Gerry carried that on the last (few) years, building a foundation of hard work."
Pino was a finalist for the job during the search that yielded Pannoni in 2020, and the two men knew each other on the East Coast since Pino also once coached in Virginia, at a school in Alexandria, very nearby to the school (South County) where Pannoni coached.
Pino has been the Rams' offensive coordinator since 2019. This will be the first head coaching job for the University of New Mexico graduate.
Things moved very fast Wednesday as the vacancy was filled; Pino said Pannoni suggested him to administrators. Pino said the two men talked at length on Tuesday, and it became clear Pannoni was going to step down.
"I have a ton of respect for coach Pannoni. The amount of effort he's been able to give to this football team, with everything he had going on at home, is amazing," said Pino, who was an all-state player for the Rams.
Four of the six teams that were in District 1-6A last fall have changed coaches during this offseason, the others being Cleveland, Cibola and West Mesa. Chris Howe replaced Rod Williams at Cibola, and Landrick Brody took over the Mustangs program from Anthony Ansotigue. But West Mesa will not be in that district next season.
