No Place Like Home

There is a saying in life that things always come full circle. Bruce Cunningham, the new head coach of the Varsity Football team at Wilton High School, is the perfect example of that. 

After being an assistant at Wilton for the past eight seasons, Cunningham is taking over the reigns this season, a position that he previously held from 1987 to 1989.

Cunningham got his start at Greenwich High School, where he worked as an assistant coach on a part-time basis to earn college credit while attending Eastern Connecticut State University. It was Mike Ornato, a legendary high school football coach for Greenwich, who helped Cunningham get into coaching and get his feet wet.

“When I first started out, I thought I knew everything about the game,” admitted Cunningham. “It was working at Wilton that got me to have a better appreciation for the game and made me realize that I needed to learn more in order to become a good head coach.”

Cunningham’s first three seasons at Wilton led him to various coaching positions around the country. From 1990 to 1993, Cunningham was involved with Bowling Green University as a coach. For two seasons after that, he was the head football coach at Tuscarawas Catholic High School in Ohio and also did a special stint as a guest coach for the Canadian Football League’s Toronto Argonauts.

In 1996, Cunningham returned to Connecticut, and specifically Fairfield, where he was the football team’s assistant coach for two seasons prior to becoming head coach in 2000. After coaching Fairfield for one season, he returned to where it all started—Wilton—as the team’s assistant coach for the next seven seasons.

“When I coached in Wilton the first time, that was when I got a greater appreciation for the game under longtime Wilton boss Tom Fujitani,” said Cunningham. “He helped push me towards college football and other coaching positions to help make myself better in the coaching profession.”

For the 2009 season, Cunningham returns to Fujitani Field, this time as the head coach of the Warriors, a position that he looks forward to and admits that it can be unpredictable.

“Not looking at our record, I know that a lot of transition has to go into effect,” admitted Cunningham. “I am not sure how the league is right now as there are many ups and downs, which makes it tough to put a number on how many games our team will win this season.”

Over his 26 years in the game, Cunningham has accumulated a lot of experience and has learned many valuable lessons that he hopes to preach to his Warriors this season and in the future.

“All the people you work with or work for have qualities that you take and try to sort through to help mold who you are,” said Cunningham. “I want our team to have a great attitude, be accountable, be responsible, and compete every day. It is these lessons that will not only make you a better football player, but mold you into a better person as well.”