“I’ve always enjoyed my time with the high school programs and I think a lot of that is going back to my own experiences as a player at Shades Valley, being at a program that was very successful in the early 2000’s under coach Kris Keplinger, I think with that camaraderie you kind of gain with your fellow classmates playing for your school, having your friends come out to games and playing your best friends, that might be on rival school programs, stuff like that,” Patridge said.
He’s also the latest in a high school coaching dynasty. He is the younger brother of Ryan Patridge, who won state championships with Oak Mountain boys soccer in 2005 and 2011, and Will Patridge, who served as Hoover’s girls soccer coach for eight seasons.
He said seeing them coach and enjoy the high school level helped direct him that way too. He thanked his brothers as well as his fellow coaches at Oak Mountain and John Carroll for developing him, including Rob Crawford, Chris Blight, McQueen, Landon Gaskins, Vestavia Hills’ David DiPiazza and Homewood’s Sean McBride.
“High school coaching, I kind of saw it from both of them, like how much they enjoyed it, the successes they had, and I was like, ‘Man, that’s kind of what I want to do, and I’ll be an assistant as long as I can, as long as I need to be, but the end goal was always, I want to be a head coach,” Patridge said.
That excitement is shared by Oak Mountain administration.
“We are excited to announce Keegan McQueen as our head girls soccer coach and Wes Patridge as our head boys soccer coach,” Oak Mountain athletic director Ryan Brewer said in a statement. “Keegan served as our boys head coach last season, and Wes has been a valuable assistant with both the boys and girls programs. Their familiarity with our student-athletes, our school and our expectations provides great continuity during this transition.
“Both coaches are extremely knowledgeable about the game, outstanding leaders and highly respected by our players and colleagues. We have great confidence in their ability to build strong relationships, develop our student-athletes and continue moving both programs forward. We’re excited to see the positive impact they will have in their new roles.”
The boys and girls teams had opposite 2026 campaigns. The girls blazed their way to a runner-up finish in Class 7A, starting the season 14-0-1, winning the Class 7A, Area 6 title and only losing to Oklahoma 6A state champion Bixby and Alabama 7A champion Auburn High School.
As for the boys, they finished 2-15-6 overall and 0-6 in area play after graduating the vast majority of a senior core that went to back-to-back state championship games and won in undefeated fashion in 2024.
Patridge said the team did the best it could having lost 16 seniors, including nine of the 11 starters, at once. He said the coaching staff worked tirelessly to improve during the season and pin down weaknesses.
More importantly, they’re determined to not let that happen again and flip the losses and draws into wins. His goal is to make sure the players feel the same.
“That’s kind of my hope for the group coming in, the guys that’ll come back, is, I think you could learn a lot from the struggles of going through a season like that,” Patridge said. “And I think that’s going to hopefully light a fire into them and really motivate them to say, ‘Hey, man, this is not Oak Mountain soccer. This is a program that’s proud. Last year is what it is. But we’re going to keep it within ourselves to not let that happen again.”