Jordan Lesley didn’t need to look far.
Growing up in Fulton, Lesley saw professional talent emerge from all over the Mississippi junior college football circuit. In his hometown, Itawamba Community College produced NFL player after NFL player: Tim Bowens, Duce Staley, Joe Horn, Pernell McPhee and more.
And that’s just one of the 15 junior colleges in the Magnolia State currently playing football.
“If you look at the list of guys who have come out of there, I think now it speaks for itself,” Lesley said.
Lesley never played a down of JUCO football, but he’s on his way to being the next name on that list.
The former East Mississippi Community College defensive coordinator was promoted to the same position at West Virginia this year, marking another step on his ascent in college football’s coaching ranks.
And he’s kept Mississippi on his mind throughout a journey that, for a young coach, has barely begun.
“I appreciate where I’ve been and where I’ve come from more than anything, but the hard work has gotten me to where I’m at, and I want to continue that climb,” Lesley said.
Beginning his third year on the Mountaineers’ staff, Lesley must adjust to his third position in as many seasons. He was the team’s defensive line coach in 2019 and added the role of co-defensive coordinator to his duties last season.
Now, he’s the lead man on WVU’s defense under head coach Neal Brown. Lesley worked under Brown at his alma mater, Troy, winning 31 games with the Trojans in three years: 10 in 2016, 11 in 2017 and 10 in 2018.
“That was a great time,” Lesley said. “I really kind of took the next step in my career and learned a ton.”
But the coach noted careers have a “natural progression,” and when Brown got the job in Morgantown, Lesley was ready to take his. Leaving Troy, though, wasn’t easy.
“It’s no different than leaving home the first time you left home,” Lesley said. “I love my family, I love where I’m from, but I’ve got to do this.”
‘It keeps you appreciative’
While it was a big step up from the Sun Belt to the Big 12, Lesley’s leap from the junior college ranks to FBS football was just as sizable.
In nine years between Kilgore College in Texas, Northwest Mississippi Community College and EMCC, Lesley learned that “no job is too small.”
“I’ve had to paint practice fields,” he said. “I’ve had to do laundry. I’ve had to help kids with financial aid. I’ve had to set up the cafeteria. It keeps you appreciative.”
Lesley put it this way: This summer, West Virginia renovated its team facility, the Milan Puskar Center. The $55 million project includes a recovery suite equipped with cryotherapy pods and float tanks, a sleep room with massage chairs and zero-gravity seats and even a players’ lounge with a barbershop inside.
At schools like Kilgore, Northwest and EMCC, it’s “not all cupcakes and rainbows” — which, Lesley said, can sometimes work to players’ advantage.
“If they don’t develop into elite student-athletes,” Lesley said, referencing players at schools like WVU, “that’s their choice. Often JUCO kids have to will their way into it because they don’t have those things.”
That means being imaginative and adaptable in order to recruit and run JUCO programs, Lesley said. Relationships with players and their families are fundamental, too.
“When you talk a kid into coming to Scooba, Mississippi, or Moorhead, Mississippi, or Goodman, Mississippi, if that kid’s going to have any success there, you better have a real relationship with that kid,” Lesley said.
The Lions’ success in Lesley’s three years at EMCC proves he, head coach Buddy Stephens and the rest of the staff succeeded in that goal. EMCC posted 12-0 records and won back-to-back NJCAA championships in 2013 and 2014 before a brawl with Mississippi Delta Community College cost the Lions a chance to play for the title in 2015.
Still, Lesley’s teams put together a 32-1 record over his three years in Scooba and never allowed more than 15 points per game — evidence that whatever he’d done had paid off.
“You kind of have to be creative and inventive with how you build that,” Lesley said.
Enjoy the ride
Lesley hoped to join Brown’s first-year staff at Troy in 2015 but was unable to make the jump until a year later. Once there, he jumped right into the mix of making the Trojans one of college football’s best defenses.
Lesley coached defensive tackles in 2016 and 2017 and was entrusted with Troy’s defensive line in 2018. Each year, the team finished inside the top 30 nationally in scoring defense.
Then Brown replaced Dana Holgorsen at West Virginia, and Lesley went with him. In February, less than six years since leaving EMCC, he was named the Mountaineers’ defensive coordinator — and he promptly received a contract extension in March.
“I think about it every day,” Lesley said of his rapid rise. “I think it’s important to always keep sight of where you’ve been. I think the big thing for me is to enjoy it and enjoy where you’re at and the work it took to be there.”
Now, Lesley is high on the chain of command at a school where resources are plenty. Like any Power Five school, he said, West Virginia practically “recruits itself.”
But that doesn’t mean Fulton, EMCC, Troy or any of the places Lesley left behind are ever far from his mind.
“It’s always going to be home,” he said. “It’s always right there in your heart. But if your goal is a big thing, you’ve got to go make big things happen.”
Theo DeRosa reports on Mississippi State sports for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter at @Theo_DeRosa.
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