Michael Campbell experienced a bevy of emotions after being named Caledonia’s newest head football coach, but none were stronger than the joyous feeling of coming home.
Campbell’s dad was a military man and he grew up in Columbus. He went to school at Immanuel (now Columbus Christian Academy), and his mom still lives in the area along with his brother. It’s a place he’s always considered home.
Now after a 22-year coaching career, mostly as an offensive coordinator, Campbell is happy to be back where he used to roam with ambitions of turning the Cavaliers football program back into a competitive one.
“I’m super excited. … Caledonia is a great school, great place, great kids. Just really looking forward to getting to lead the program and doing it my way and hopefully bring some success back. It hasn’t been that long since they have been very successful, I know they’ve had two down years, but they’ve had some success and they know what it takes to get there. I’m excited about leading them back to that and working with the staff that’s already there. They are some really good guys that I’ve coached against in my previous coaching career and I know a lot about them. That’s another reason I was excited about having the opportunity to be at Caledonia.”
Campbell is replacing Michael Kelly, who stepped down from his post in January after seven years in charge to become the athletic director and head football coach at Noxapater Attendance Center. Campbell has previously served as offensive coordinator at Tupelo, Itawamba Agricultural and most recently, Petal, and will be the offensive playcaller for the Cavs for this upcoming season with hopes of transforming a unit that only produced 204 points in 2025.
“We are going to take the kids that we have and put them in the best possible scenario to be successful and give them the best opportunity to be successful,” Campbell said. “So, if that means we are going to be a tight end and a wing, then we’ll be a tight end and a wing. Or if we are going to be five-wide and throw it around 30-something times a game, then that’s what we’ll do to win. My philosophy is we’re going to keep our base plays and we are going to be very simple in what we do, but we’re going to present it a hundred different ways with a lot of smoke and mirrors, a lot of motions and moving around.
“A change of pace – we may play really slow at times and we may speed the game up and turn it into a track meet. It just depends on what we’ve got from year-to-year. It doesn’t really change what I do, just change how we do it.”
Campbell brings three years of head coaching experience from when he was stationed at Smithville from 2017-2019, which includes the Seminoles’ run to the 2018 North Half Championship game, and left with a 28-11 record.
“I have worked with some of the state’s best (head coaches),” he said. “(Petal head coach) Marcus Boyles is a hall of famer – just to watch him do what he does and learn from him for two years. I worked with Toby Collums, who is the head coach at Madison Central, an amazing guy and amazing coach. I worked with Trent Hammond at Tupelo, he’s up there as one of the state’s best. The guys that I’ve been around and learned from have really just kept me passionate about the one day that the opportunity came back to me (to be a head coach again) and just jump(ed) on it.
“Caledonia just fit everything that I was really looking for; just a great place, a great school with really good leadership. The administration there really seems ready to really focus on some athletics and really start moving. If you look at all the other programs at Caledonia, they’re having a lot of success. Football – it’s time for us to get back there.”
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