Jim Foti, Former Jamestown Star, Returns to Wheeling

Wheeling, W. Va.—In the ordinary course of events, it is very seldom that an athletic coach returns to a former job, yet that is exactly what Jim Foti. former Wheeling Central High School mentor, is going to do, come next fall.

Foti. a Jamestown High School and John Carroll University graduate, took over the coaching reins at Central High here in 1941, and in three years' time guided the basketball, football and track teams into a prominent place in state athletics, his cage team grabbing a couple of state titles and his footballers driving from a low spot in the second division to a high first division status in the strong Ohio Valley High School Athletic Conference.

Then a lucrative offer from Bellaire, O. High School beckoned Foti and he accepted the athletic directorship, and head coaching jobs in football, basketball and track there. Still in the same league, Foti took charge of the sagging athletic fortunes at Bellaire and in two years brought the Bellaires into the league's top ranks.

With the return of several servicemen to the Bellaire coaching staff, Foti resigned and started looking around for a job. Wheeling Central's school board members heard Foti was seeking a post and lost no time in contacting him, and as a result, the rehiring of Foti was anounced today.

By a coincidence, the Wheeling Central football team of 1940 won one game, lost nine, and the school's gridders compiled an identical record in 1945. It remains to be seen whether Foti can repeat his magic.