On Wednesday, March 20th, Penn High School announced the new leader of Penn football. Pete Riordan has been named the new football coach after Cory Yeoman retired at the end of the 2023 football season. Cory Yeoman coached for over 40 years at Penn before deciding it was time to retire. Yeoman likes Riordan as the new coach, saying in a press conference that Wednesday, “{he is} super organized, driven, there’s no project you [could] give Pete that wouldn’t get done and extremely well.” He then highlighted how great of a communicator Riordan is, and how he understands the journey to greatness, “[he] understands the big picture, understands the small picture, and how you get to the places you want to go and understand what needs to get done to get there.”
Coach Riordan has been on the Penn football staff for 20 years now. Before getting the head coaching job, he was the defensive coordinator. Riordan has also coached in 4 state championship games as an assistant coach, Penn placing runner-up in each of those state championship games. In the entire history of Penn football, he’s only the seventh head coach, and he’s only the third in the past 50 years.
“It’s a huge honor, it’s an absolute huge honor,” Riordan said during the Wednesday press conference.
Players are also ready and excited to start the new era of Kingsmen football. Defensive player Vinny Freeman was there to speak at the Press conference, “what excites me the most is the stability we get coming back to the program with Coach Pete; every day you know what he’s going to be like coming in.”
Penn finished last year with a 10-2 record both an NIC championship and a sectional championship. Coach Riordan is looking to fill the shoes of legends like Chris Geesman and Cory Yeoman, with the goal to win Penn their first state championship since 2000.
Melinda Kiner 
Diego Sotelo Gonzalez 
Marie Roach