A familiar face is returning to the foothills community.
Former Crescenta Valley High girls’ basketball coach Jason Perez is returning to La Crescenta Montrose with a new role in sports: athletic director at St. Monica Academy.
Perez will move back to California from Florida on July 19 and has already started his role as the Crusaders’ athletic director from the Sunshine state, working remotely to schedule out most of the fall sports calendar from afar.
“It’s a great opportunity and I’m looking forward to doing it,” he said, noting he is keen to return to a state with the proper resources to support education and athletics.
A lifelong Catholic, Perez said he had wanted to go back to work in a school setting which shared his religious views, having coached 15 years at various Catholic schools and in the Catholic Youth Organization. He added that his familiarity with the La Crescenta Montrose community along with “significant pay” also played a major role in his decision for a “dream job.”
“I wasn’t even looking that much until this opportunity popped up and all of a sudden, it’s like we can go back,” Perez said.
The next step for the new St. Monica Academy administrator is to figure out sites and facilities for the school’s sports teams to host competitions.
“Once I get there, I’m going to be hitting the ground running,” said Perez, who is set to oversee nine boys’ varsity and nine girls’ varsity sports programs.
The Crusaders primarily compete in the Heritage League against the likes of Trinity Classical Academy in Santa Clarita as well as Lancaster Baptist School and Desert Christian High School in the Antelope Valley. St. Monica Academy, which is home to roughly 130 students and located at 2361 Del Mar Road in Montrose, comes alive when the school year officially starts on Sept. 3.
Perez will also serve as the athletic director for the younger St. Monica Academy grade levels, from the fifth- to eighth-grade classes. He’s hoping to guide them from an early age and get them “coordinated with the high school teams.”
“When they’re coming into the high school, they [will] know the system,” Perez said. “They know the program. They know how things work. I think that’s going to be one of the biggest things — getting them to where it’s one, big program and not a separation between middle school and high school.”
Perez will continue to coach as well, spearheading the St. Monica Academy varsity girls’ basketball program. He previously worked at Crescenta Valley High School for 16 years and coached the Falcons varsity girls’ basketball team, guiding the team to back-to-back Pacific League titles in 2017 and 2018.
“I still love coaching,” he said. “I’m still going to coach, but I wanted to get out of the classroom. I’m done being in the classroom. I wanted to move into the athletic administration part of things where I’m doing sports because that’s what I know best.”
Perez, who grew up nearby Burbank, is coming back to California after moving to Florida during the throes of the coronavirus pandemic. Financial predicaments and the uncertainty of normalcy specifically prompted the move to the Sunshine State.
The longtime coach continued working in education in Florida, and coached girls’ basketball at Cape Coral High School for two years and spent one year at Archbishop McCarthy in Fort Lauderdale.
During his short stint at Archbishop McCarthy, Perez was tasked to completely rebuild the girls’ basketball program “from the ground up,” inheriting a nine-player team that had finished 2-20 overall the year before and growing it to a 25-person roster that ended the season 13-12. It was the first winning record in 10 years.
A CATHOLIC SCHOOL RIGHT OFF THE 210
Promoting the school’s programs is one of Perez’s top priorities as the new St. Monica Academy athletic director, hoping to let nearby communities know that there is another Catholic school along the 210 Freeway.
“People are going to get to know that there’s a Catholic high school right there — that’s not St. Francis, that’s not [Mission Hills] Alemany, that’s not Providence [Burbank],” he said. “There’s another one right there that’s doing very well.”
From an athletic standpoint, Perez praised the staff of veteran coaches who will help student-athletes to reach their potentials both on and off the field.
“It’s taking the programs that we have and maximizing the efficiency and the success of what we have right out the gate,” he added.
Serving as athletic director for the lower-level schools gives St. Monica coaches “a big advantage” as well, Perez added, since many of the students will be familiar with the athletics personnel and activities from a young age if they stick with the school early on.
“Being able to coordinate [the athletics] from fifth grade to 12th grade … is going to strengthen the high school program,” he added. “It’s going to make it much stronger because most of the kids from the elementary go straight into the high school.”
Once his priorities are in place, Perez said he will assess how the school functions with the new system and consider expanding existing programs or adding new sports teams.
“As an athletic director, I’d love to see 8-man football. I love the idea of Friday night lights,” said Perez, who also coached football at CVHS.
Perez also praised the academic resources St. Monica provides, calling the school’s education “unrivaled” and “unparalleled.” Along with his other priorities, Perez’s ultimate goal is to match athletics and academics to provide students the best education environment possible and hopefully attract future scholars.
“What we’re hoping for is now that the athletic program is equally on par with the education, the kids will have a great experience,” he said.
