By Fred Liggett
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The St. Michael’s High School football program has a new leader and it’s someone well known in the Show-Me State.
Mark Bliss was introduced to players, their parents and many SMA boosters at an event held at the high school on Thursday, Feb. 6.
The 58-year-old Bliss replaces Andrew Pitts who resigned at the end of the 2024 season and becomes the third head football coach in school history. Bliss has a history of success having won four state titles in his 28 years of coaching. Many of Bliss coaching wins occurred during his time working in Iowa but happily claims quite a few here in Missouri. Bliss mentioned a highlight for him was coaching Ozark to a playoff game victory in 2012 over favored LS West.
Bliss hopes to lock in his first coaching staff in the next 2-3 weeks. Bliss is excited to “welcome nine starters back on offense and five starters on defense.” Guardians fans can expect the teams “offense to run a lot of the same as Odessa” according to Coach Bliss. While at Odessa they ran a “triangle offense.”
Bliss teams works around for pillars, as he calls it a GOLD Standard. GOLD stands for Gratitude, Ownership, Leadership/Love and Discipline. A number of factors led Bliss to the St. Michael’s football job. Bliss said he “had two interviews before being offered the job, excited.” Bliss adds he “always wanted to coach at a catholic school.” Add family reasons to the list as Bliss has a daughter and two granddaughters in the Kansas City area.
In addition to the state titles and games won, Coach Bliss has coached eight High School All-Americans and 116 of his players later became college scholarship players. Soon coach Bliss and his first staff will get to work to add to those numbers while guiding the St. Michael’s football program.
