R.J. Wilson ousted as Northern Durham football coach

After four seasons, R.J. Wilson was ousted as Northern Durham’s football coach. Wilson said he was informed of the decision by Northern principal Dan Gilfort on Friday.

“The administration decided they wanted to go in a different direction today. There was no indication of it prior to when I was called in today after school,” Wilson said. “There wasn’t any other good reasoning except the principal just wanted to go in a different direction.”

Wilson was 19-30 overall but never finished lower than third in the PAC-6 Conference and made the playoffs each season. Northern’s nonconference record suffered by playing one of the toughest slates in the Triangle.

Last year’s team went 5-7 overall, and the 2015 reached the second round of the 4A playoffs.

In the evening on the day of his firing, Wilson heard from a number of former players.

“It’s always to hear from the current players and the former players, who are either graduated or getting ready to graduate to let you know you did a lot of positive things other than just try to win football games while you were there,” Wilson said. “It makes you feel good about your time as coach.”

Wilson said he would like to coach next season, but will take some time in the coming weeks to reflect. He and his wife are going to welcome their first kid in the coming days.

“I think the salutatorian from this year will be a football player, the past two valedictorians were football players. We’re getting kids on (college) football rosters,” Wilson said. “I feel proud we’re starting to build something. I definitely feel like the program is better than it was four years ago.”

There are now eight vacancies in The N&O area also including: Southern Vance, Northern Vance, Orange, Southern Lee, Harnett Central, Goldsboro and Enloe.

This story was originally published February 10, 2017 at 10:04 PM with the headline "R.J. Wilson ousted as Northern Durham football coach."