National association recognizes Cabrini’s Maronge

By Ron Brocato, Sports
Clarion Herald


The Archdiocese of New Orleans is blessed to have several of Louisiana’s finest high school athletic directors and coaches to care for its student athletes at every Catholic secondary school under its educational umbrella. And, among the best of this talented collection of professional sports administrators is a man who runs the athletic department at Cabrini High School.

Since 2015, Kirk Maronge has been performing the myriad of tasks it takes to run the many sports his school has to offer at a high level. And, like his fellow athletic directors whose workdays last well into the night, Maronge doesn’t lock the gymnasium to go home until every student and coach has left the campus.

Living in Jesuit Bend, a 40-minute ride out of the city on a good traffic day, he sometimes has to spend the night in a guest apartment on campus if one of the school's teams is traveling the next morning. That’s because he’s also the bus driver.

Maronge’s dedication to the job and the young women he serves has been noticed by the National High School Athletic Coaches Association, an organization dedicated to serving coaches and athletic directors by recognizing their achievements.

The NHSACA selected Maronge as its choice for Louisiana AD of the year for 2021-22.

The athletic director is the top executive at more than 400 high schools that participate in LHSAA-sanctioned sports. And Maronge was selected for an opportunity to become a national finalist for AD of the Year because his  work exceeds his job description.

A modest man who rarely trumpets his accomplishments to others, Maronge expressed his views as to why he was selected as the Louisiana banner carrier.

“People know that I’m not just a figurehead, but also the guy in the trenches,” Maronge said. “Everything I do is centered on how I can create the very best atmosphere and experience for these kids at Cabrini.

“So, if I have to be the guy who has to do everything, which includes staying here overnight to get up early to load the team bus with a 10-by-20-foot tent, tables and coolers for a track meet in Baton Rouge, and then drive the bus, well, that’s what I’ll do.”

At larger schools, most athletic directors delegate those duties to a staff of coaches. But Cabrini has 12 athletic programs in a student population of just below 350 girls, so Maronge, oftentimes, steps out of the scope of a typical AD.

“I’m not the normal athletic director,” he said. “I am at school at 7 a.m. to mingle with our students and to supervise them in the cafeteria before the school day begins at 8 o’clock. Whether I have lunch duty or not, every day I am walking around during both lunch periods, interacting with all of our students. This gives me an opportunity to know all of them, not just the student-athletes.”

Maronge’s career in athletics began when he graduated from LSU in 1993 with a degree in business administration, with a major in finance.

Having played linebacker on Archbishop Shaw’s football team, he soon found himself at Buras High School, where his uncle, Stanley Gaudet, was the principal and offered him a teaching position.

“I had aspirations of doing something big in the business world,” Maronge said.

But he heard another voice that led him on a different path.

“I preach to my kids, ‘Don’t do what you want to be; do what the Lord tells you to do,” Maronge said. “And I believe we are called to do certain things, and he’s going to tell us which direction we’re going to take.”

There was a teacher shortage in Plaquemines Parish, so he took a job teaching at Boothville-Venice in the morning and at Buras in the afternoon. Buras’ AD, Amos Cormier, assigned Maronge additional duties as an assistant football coach and head coach of the girls’ basketball and baseball teams.

From there, he returned to Shaw as a teacher and coach, and in eight years at his alma mater, Maronge became the school’s athletic director.

He continued to move up the educational ladder when in 2003 he became De La Salle’s dean of admissions and student life. Then in 2005, a position opened at Archbishop Rummel.

“Rummel was big at that time with about 1,300 students, and they had a need for a director of marketing and community relations,” Maronge noted. “The job included getting the alumni and community involved in all the different sports, band boosters, Genesian boosters, the grandfathers’ club and all the alumni as well as being an assistant AD.

Then Hurricane Katrina struck the city two months later and turned Rummel into a transitional school. With little marketing to do in a storm-ravaged city, he was moved into the finance office to collect tuition. Maronge also oversaw the school’s cheer and dance teams.

“It was in 2009-10 that we started fielding lacrosse, rugby and power lifting as club sports, so they created an assistant AD position to have someone to lead them,” he continued. “I had hopes that I would become the AD when Phil Greco retired.”

Instead, after 10 years at Rummel, Maronge found a new career at Cabrini in 2015 as a teacher and assistant sports administrator. A year later, the school’s AD retired, and Maronge had a new calling, which he accepted with newfound vigor.

“About six years ago one of our girls came to me to ask if we could start a golf team,” Maronge said. “I explored the possibility and talked to our principal (Yvonne Hrapmann), and we started a golf program for this one little girl. She qualified to compete in the state tournament and did a tremendous job. She signed with Loyola and recently graduated and is about to start law school.

“I found out that another student was a gymnast for a private club and called her mother to see if she would be interested in her daughter competing for Cabrini in the state championship meet. She said she would if Cabrini had a team. I told her that we didn’t have a team because we hadn’t had a gymnast.

“The rest is history. I added the sport, and I am the coach and the young girl has represented Cabrini at the state meet for two years. And this year Cabrini will have two gymnasts.”

And don’t try  to tell this former coach at all-boys’ schools  about competition among young women.

“At the first volleyball match I attended, I saw girls flying around and diving on the floor to save a point. Yeah, girls compete as hard and have the same desire to win as the boys.”

As he spoke, Maronge peered out his office window at the adjacent Desmare Playground softball field, where Cabrini plays its home games. Although it’s the property of the New Orleans Recreation Department (NORD), Maronge spreads sod and manicures the infield to get it prepared for the upcoming season.

“Last weekend I was on the bobcat getting the field ready for a new season,” he said. “When the girls came out last Tuesday for the opening practice, the field looked nice, and they were proud to be there,” he said.

Like his coaching peers, Maronge takes pride in his work.

“No task is too small for me. That’s who I am.”

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