Bill Hayes says that no matter what happens with his pursuit of the position of athletics director at Winston-Salem State, he's coming home to Winston-Salem.
Hayes, who resigned on Friday as athletics director at Florida A&M, said yesterday that he is following the plan he laid out for himself earlier this year.
"I had planned to resign in June, but I decided to stay through the football season so this was no secret for those who are close to me," Hayes said about his resignation from Florida A&M.
Hayes, 64, says he has had discussions with Donald Reaves, the chancellor at WSSU, and that those discussions will continue.
Hayes will remain at FAMU until December to complete the football season and to oversee the opening of a new 10,000-seat on-campus basketball arena.
"I'm still getting paid until Dec. 31 from Florida A&M, so that was part of the agreement," Hayes said.
In the meantime, Hayes will sell his house in Tallahassee and then at some point move back to his home in Winston-Salem that he has owned since his days of coaching football at WSSU in the 1970s and '80s.
"We have a home there still and we are coming back there to live no matter what happens," Hayes said. "I bet I've spent about three months total in that house since 1987."
Hayes also has spent a lot of money in the last several months renovating the house in the Pine Brook Country Club area, getting ready for what he called the next chapter in his life.
Now whether that chapter includes coming back to WSSU to be athletics director is a possibility.
Hayes says that the challenge of taking over at WSSU is something that's right up his alley.
"I'm a very energetic guy with no health problems, and I love to build programs," said Hayes, who was also athletics director at N.C. Central before going to Florida A&M two years ago.
It was in 1987 that Hayes coached his final season of football at WSSU before moving to N.C. A&T where he lasted 15 years before being forced out after the 2002 season.
Hayes said that one thing he dislikes about living in Tallahassee is the distance from his family and from several former players that he coached during his years at WSSU and N.C. A&T.
"I'm going to float from Raleigh to Charlotte for the rest of my life because that's where most of my former players are, and I've really kind of missed watching their families grow up and things like that," Hayes said.
After Hayes was forced out at N.C. A&T, he quickly landed on his feet as the athletics director at N.C. Central, his alma mater. He says he has learned plenty during his time in administration and would bring that to WSSU.
"I've learned so much in how to build programs, raise money, and how to have booster clubs and halls of fames," Hayes said. "And I think the thing that has to happen at Winston-Salem State is you have to take the ‘I' out of the equation and start thinking about what's best for the university."
jdell@wsjournal.com.
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