New classification – same result.
The jump to 5A from 4A has ended just like the last two seasons for Caledonia’s boys soccer team: a region championship and a guaranteed spot in the playoffs. The Cavaliers accomplished that feat last week with a 3-2 win on the road at Pontotoc.
“(It’s the) third (region title) for the boys, and obviously us being in a new district this year there were some challenges there, but they rose to the occasion,” head coach Louis Alexander said.
The Cavs (18-3) breezed through battles in Region 1-5A to the tune of a 9-1 record, only dropping one game to second-place finisher Lafayette. Since that loss, Caledonia surged to win seven straight games and finished out region play with a 46-8 goal differential in region games. It’s not just one or two players leading the charge either, Alexander said, but a host of Cavs, young and veteran, have been playing key roles and delivering in big moments all season.
“One thing I think we do a good job of here is, we develop these younger players because at some point they are going to have to, A – step in and contribute, or B – not. It’s a year-round type program here, so it’s not like Day 1 you are thrown to the wolves,” Alexander said. “You can kind of see the writing on the wall and we’re priming them and getting them ready for their opportunity.”
This season has been somewhat of a turnaround year for the Cavs, even though they won a region title last year. In 2025 they finished 10-8-1 in a run through 4A that ended in the second round of the playoffs, with the majority of those wins coming from district games. There was a lot of growth within the team during the offseason, skill-wise and from a tactical standpoint, and Alexander said that all of those key parts of soccer have gelled together this season to create the success they are now seeing.
“The main thing is that they are starting to have a higher soccer IQ,” he said. “At times, it’s not that they tried not to follow the gameplan but at times they would kind of hit the panic button if things weren’t going well. Now, this group, they are going to follow what I have set out for them on the scouting report from the first minute to the 80th minute or into overtime or whatever the case may be. They are just going to stick to it and trust in the process. They are able to implement what we do in training as well as our tactical talk and walk through. Game-in, game-out they understand exactly what I’m asking of them per each game, each opponent.”
Caledonia has outscored all of its foes 65-20, thanks in part to Paxton Fowlkes and Cohen Clark, two of the team’s leading scorers, and it’s also been dominant on defense as well with goalie Walker Ferguson and also Aiden Allen in the backline holding down the fort. Alexander said, however, that everyone deserves some credit on defense.
“We have some studs. … We really pride ourselves on, ‘Everyone defends,’ Alexander said. “No one really likes defending, even if you are a defender. You want the ball at your team’s feet as much as possible, but I’d be a fool to not think we’re not going to have to defend at times. We pride ourselves in every guy defending. … I feel like the defending, our success, is more of a team thing as opposed to a certain line or an individual.”
The Cavaliers will take a No. 1 seed into the Class 5A playoffs, but before they can get there they have to finish out the regular season, which was extended a week due to the recent winter weather. The team hosts Saltillo tomorrow at 4 p.m. and wraps up the regular season on Feb. 2 at Itawamba Agricultural, whom the Cavs beat 1-0 earlier in the season. The postseason begins on Feb. 7 for 1A-4A and Feb. 10 for 5A-7A. The state championship game will be played at Germantown on Feb. 21, and Alexander and his crew are aiming to book their ticket.
“We’re super excited, but there’s a fine line there,” he said. “I think we preached so much in the locker room that I think we are not going to hang our hat on what we’ve done. We accomplished a bunch of the small goals we set out for ourselves, but we’d trade every single one of those goals for the big one.”
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