New Foothill football Coach Tom Meiss got...

New Foothill football Coach Tom Meiss got a big assist when Dick Hill accepted an offer to join Meiss’ staff.

Hill, 63, is the county’s winningest coach with 196 victories but was fired this year after a dispute with Santa Ana Principal Andrew Hernandez. When Meiss was named coach at Foothill last month, he immediately offered Hill a job.

Meiss says Hill’s presence at Foothill will help to influence some of the school’s top athletes, who declined to play football last year, to come out. Meiss also said he doesn’t anticipate Hill having any problems making an adjustment to an assistant.

“When we work together as a staff, we just do what needs to be done, it’s not a matter of who’s in charge,” Meiss said. “I anticipate Dick will have fresher batteries under this system (as a walk-on) than he would if he were still teaching.”