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“Even in my Pine Sol-induced haze, it was not lost on me that Billie Jean King was tweeting about me,” she said.

April Florie, who is believed to be the first female coach in the Shore Conference and one of a handful of female varsity football coaches in New Jersey, didn’t set out to be a groundbreaker, she said Tuesday as she spoke about her journey into coaching high school football.

She had one goal in mind: to make friends at her new job.

Florie, a special education teacher, had taken a position at Toms River High School East in late 2022 after spending 10 years teaching in the Barnegat Schools and was looking for a way to build relationships with her new co-workers.

In Barnegat, “I was involved. I felt comfortable. It was an easy fit for me,” she said. The new school brought with it a wide range of ages, from teachers who were just out of college to veterans.

“When you go and get a new job at this age it’s a different experience,” Florie said. “You have to find a way to enmesh yourself into the fabric of a new job.”

Florie decided the best way was to get involved in the school. She was standing in the school office when the opportunity arose.

“I saw the football coach — he’s a friendly young man — and I said, ‘Do you need any help?’ “ Florie said.

“I can always use some help,” Kyle Sandberg, the head coach of the Raiders, told Florie.

“Sign me up,” Florie told him. “I’ll sign you up,” Sandberg replied.

Florie saw herself as a casual football fan. She watched NFL games as a child and an adult — she has been a Washington fan since she was young, a tough choice growing up in Bloomfield surrounded by New York Giants fans. Her son, Mike, loves football but played baseball at East. Her daughter, Camille, is a field hockey player at East.

But volunteering to help coach the football team seemed like the right choice, she said.

“I just figured (Sandberg) was the right person to do it with,” Florie said. “I am not a halfway lady. I don’t do anything a little bit.”

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She told Sandberg up front that she did not come to the program with extensive football knowledge but that was not a deterrent.

“I have these other great skills. I’m not a wallflower, I’m a communicator and a leader, and I had the guts to try this,” she said.

“I can teach you the intricacies of football,” Sandberg told her. “Coaching is innate.”

Florie was approved as a volunteer in May but did not join the team until practices in August because she was teaching English language arts lessons to special education students during the extended school year program.

Her first practice was on a hot day in the midst of the heat wave.

“I’m not a bashful personality but I was shaking in my sneakers,” Florie said. She was welcomed without hesitation.

“The other football coaches were so kind,” she said, telling her that they, too, had been new once and understood the trepidation of being new. “My associates were wonderful.”

“The boys were a little confused at first,” she said. They had been told in May that she was joining as a volunteer coach, and she had gotten a lot of questions.

“They were asking me what capacity I would be helping with the team,” she said, even asking if she would be the team mom. Not in a malicious way; “they were genuinely excited but confused.”

“I said, ‘I’m going to do whatever the boss tells me to do,’ ” Florie said. “It was pretty funny.”

There were no issues of respect, she said. “They listened when I yelled and they listened when I whispered. It was great.”

Florie said she immersed herself in learning the intricacies of football, listening to the other coaches and studying everything she could get her hands on. One of her favorite tasks became analyzing game film.

“You know when you start on Netflix and you’re going to watch one episode of the show and four hours later you’re still watching?” she said. “I didn’t know how many hours I would spend. It’s my new addiction, my new bingeworthy show.”

“We’d get a message that the game films were up on Sunday mornings, and I was right there with my coffee,” Florie said.

The learning experience has been something she welcomed because it’s a challenge, drawing the contrast with her experience and comfort with her abilities as a veteran teacher.

“Learning football was like learning another language. There’s a huge learning curve that I continue to learn. It’s something I had to work on that was real learning,” Florie said.

The only real issue she faced as a woman was a lack of bathroom facilities. On more than one occasion when the Raiders played at other schools, there were no girls’ bathrooms open.

“They pulled all of the boys out of the bathroom and built me a defensive line” so she could use the restroom. “ ‘Nobody goes in until Coach Florie comes out,’ they’d say” she said with a laugh.

Being part of the team has given her a real appreciation for the way football can bring the community together.

“I was completely humbled to see the reach football has,” Florie said. “Friday night football is such a big thing in this town. It was wonderful to be on the sidelines on a Friday night and experience that with the players and feel that energy.”

There was an unexpected benefit, too.

“The camaraderie built around the sport, it kind of next-leveled my family,” Florie said of her relationship with her children. “It was something great to talk about.”

Her children have been very supportive.

“My daughter loved it. She’s a super-involved student, and we know our own boundaries,” she said. “My son was more than proud.”

Florie said she’s hopeful of continuing to volunteer with the football team next season, to build on what she learned this fall. “Year 2 would be interesting because now I know what to expect.”

She’s grateful for the experience and for Sandberg welcoming her assistance.

“There was full transparency between us. When people are transparent it kind of opens up your minds,” Florie said. “I was willing to take a chance on this young guy and he was willing to take a chance on me.”

“If everybody took a page out of that we’d all be better off,” she said.

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