COLUMBUS – Columbus is on the market for a new head football coach for the fifth time in the past decade.
Former Mississippi State and Canadian Football League star Barrin Simpson has resigned after two seasons as head football coach of the Falcons, CMSD confirmed Wednesday to The Dispatch.
Simpson went 4-16 overall and missed the playoffs in both seasons. In 2024, Simpson guided Columbus to a 3-7 mark but went 1-9 in 2025.
“I want to thank Columbus Municipal School District for the opportunity…” Simpson said. “I definitely appreciate the opportunity to be the head football coach at Columbus High School,”
Simpson told The Dispatch the parting was a “mutual decision to go in different directions.”
“There is great potential at Columbus,” Simpson said. “There’s talented kids there, the opportunity for growth is there, and whoever is the next head coach will have those opportunities. It can be a great place.”
Simpson replaced Josh Pulphus, who led the Falcons for five seasons but resigned following a one-win 2023 season that saw Columbus go winless in district play.
“I have received and accepted Coach Simpson’s resignation,” CMSD superintendent Craig Chapman said on Wednesday. “The next step in the process will be to submit the resignation to the CMSD Board of Trustees for approval. On behalf of the school district, I thank Coach Simpson for his dedication and work to our football program and student athletes for the past two years. We wish him well in his future endeavors.”
The search for the next CHS football coach will begin once the board of trustees has accepted Simpson’s resignation.
Simpson came to Columbus having most recently coached at Timber Creek High School in Fort Worth, Texas, one of five high schools and six stops in Texas he made in the past decade of his coaching career.
Simpson graduated from Starkville High School and won back-to-back state championships with the Yellow Jackets in 1994 and 1995.
He went on to have a prolific career at Mississippi State, where was one of the best linebackers in school history, earning First Team All-American honors in 1999. In his four-year Bulldog career, Simpson recorded 296 tackles, 11 tackles for loss, five sacks, 30 quarterback pressures and three interceptions. He was named a Southeastern Conference Legend in 2019.
Simpson then went on to have an incredibly successful professional career, first playing for the San Francisco Demons of the original XFL in 2001 before an 11-year career in the Canadian Football League.
While playing in the CFL for the BC Lions, Winnipeg Blue Bombers and Saskatchewan Roughriders, he was a seven-time CFL All-Star, 2001 CFL Rookie of the Year and the league’s leading tackler five times.
Dispatch sports editor Philip Poe contributed to this report.
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