Hart baseball will remain in familiar hands following longtime coach Jim Ozella’s retirement.
The school announced Ozella’s replacement, Brad Meza, on Monday in a press release, three days after the program won the CIF Division 2 title.
Meza, a Hart alumnus and former player for Ozella, takes on the program after three years as the Valencia skipper.
“Hart High School is proud to announce Brad Meza as the new varsity head baseball coach for our program,” the school’s release said. “Coach Meza takes over a program that was league champions on all three levels in 2024, and most recently the CIF Southern Section Division 2 Champions. Brad has previously been a coach at Hart on the freshman and varsity levels from 2018-2021. In 2022, coach Meza accepted the varsity head coaching job at Valencia High School where he led the Vikings to a Foothill League championship in 2023.”
Meza’s overall coaching record at Valencia was 53-32-1, the release said.
“Brad was a major contributor to the 2014 and 2015 Foothill League champion Hart baseball team, who were CIF Southern Section finalists during his senior year,” the release said. “After graduating from Hart, Brad played college baseball at Northern Arizona University for two years and majored in English. Coach Meza is currently a Hart district employee and plans to continue with his special education assistant job on campus at Hart High School next year. He also plans to continue having the Hart baseball program be a Tradition of Champions.”
The release added that Meza believes that through discipline, fundamentals, hard work and competition, his student athletes will gain the necessary life tools to live successful lives both on and off the field.
Meza will lead Hart in its inaugural year as Hawks baseball.
