NATCHEZ — The two-time defending district champion Cathedral Boys’ Soccer Team will have a new man at the helm when it attempts to three-peat this fall.

Dennis Hogue is taking over as head coach of the boys’ soccer team after serving as an assistant for the girls’ team last year, he said.

“Cathedral is home for me,” said Hogue, who was the head coach at Natchez High for eight years until the 2009 season. “The whole time it was understood (at Natchez) that when my daughter got old enough to play at Cathedral I would step down, because I can’t coach against my daughter.”

Hogue’s daughter Emma will be a seventh grader on the Green Wave girls’ team next season.

Hogue said he accepted the job Tuesday, July 5.

Hogue takes over for Rick Simons as the Cathedral boys’ coach.

Simons recently started a new business and had a baby and could not devote the amount of time necessary to be head coach, Hogue said. Simons still plans to help the team when he can.

“I told (administration) I’d (coach the team), but I still want Rick in here because he’s just great, the kids love him and he knows the game as well as anybody,” Hogue said. “He’s still going to be on board, and when he gets free time he’s going to come help us out.”

Hogue said his familiarity with the Cathedral program and the returning players will be a great benefit next season, and he expects to have a good team returning.

“We already have a rapport, so there won’t be that funky, first-day feeling,” he said.

“We only have three guys that aren’t returning. Everybody else on the team has a lot of talent, even with those three gone. The team will be solid. Our main thing is to get them in soccer shape, the skills are there, they just need to be refined.”

Hogue said he has been involved in the game for 20 years and will bring a light-hearted but hard-working attitude to the team when they start practice in mid-October.

“It’s just fun being around young kids,” he said. “It keeps you young, and they are comical and funny. But the truth of the matter is I want to teach a strong soccer team that is really competitive. When the game is on they will play hard 100 percent of the time.”

Hogue said he would focus on sportsmanship, teamwork and hard work and hopes that his players will remember some of his lessons for years to come.

As far as results go, Hogue expects his team to be the favorite to win the district title again and hopes to make it to state.

“You always want to go as far as you can,” he said. “We almost expect to win district, that’s our attitude. Not that it’s a gimme or anything, but we have the kids to do it.”

Hogue said the team would start its run toward another district title when it takes the pitch for its first game in early November.