Lincoln County coach Larry Campbell, already a coaching legend, is closing in on 300 victories.

Web posted August 29, 1997

 Larry's numbers

By Rob Mueller
Staff Writer

LINCOLNTON, Ga. -- The redheaded country boy inherited his daddy's sweatshop mentality, so when he wanted nothing more than to coach football, the prettiest cheerleader at Calhoun Falls High knew what she was in for.

Time has been spent wishing her own children got to know daddy the way two generations of Lincolnton kids know him. There have been lonely times spent at home while her husband was out building a high school sports dynasty.

But don't let Connie Campbell, the pretty cheerleader from Calhoun Falls, S.C., fool you. She has no complaints. After more than a quarter-century as the first lady of Lincoln County High School football, there are few disappointments to dwell on, even fewer regrets.

Sure, maybe she's been the giver, he the high-maintenance zealot with the career that demanded so much.

But with her remarkable husband, the regrets and disappointments over the years have been rarer than Red Devils defeats.

``God put me with the right person,'' she says. ``I couldn't imagine life without football. I couldn't imagine being married to anyone else. He's the perfect husband.''

Turns out this is the life she always envisioned: Raise two kids in the little Georgia town right out of the country girl's storybook. Marry the country boy jock and local icon. Bask in the status brought by gridiron success. Share the glory.

Nirvana.

``I just love Lincoln County,'' she says. ``This is home, where we raised our children. I've never wanted to be anywhere else. Sure, it was hard raising two children and it was hard for him. He's felt like all this time, he's given so much more to everyone else's kids than he has his own. But that's the price you pay. I've thoroughly enjoyed being married to him. I've never wanted anything more out of life.''

But, sometimes, she wonders about the legendary husband of her's, winner of 290 Lincoln County football games and nine state championships, all before his 50th birthday.

Is this what Larry Campbell has wanted from life?

``There will always be the, `What if?,''' she says. ``Looking back, I think he would have wanted the challenge, you know, to see if he could have done what he's done somewhere else.''

Larry Campbell, of course is a fervent competitor. After all, you don't become the fifth winningest coach in Georgia history with a 290-40-2 record and winning percentage (.873) better than the four legends ahead of you - Mary Persons' Dan Pitts, Dalton's Bill Chappell, the late Wayman Creel of Northside, Lakeside and Westminster, and the late Nick Hyder of Valdosta - without that special trait.

Not even at a place as special as Lincoln County.

``Coach, he's won so much, he doesn't like to lose,'' says Campbell's longtime assistant Howard Ellis. ``He used to not handle losing too good. He handles it much better now, but he still doesn't like it that much.''

Sometimes, though, Larry Campbell has questions.

How much of Lincoln County's storied success is his doing?

How could he lose with the teams he's had?

Could he have done what he has done anywhere else?

``Players win football games and players lose football games,'' says Campbell, who turns 49 on the day he opens his 28th season - 26th as its head coach - at Lincoln County, against Washington-Wilkes on Sept. 5.

``When you win, the players get the credit, and they should. I'm not so sure I have done anything as a head coach that another man couldn't have done here, as well.''

``I think it's been a little of both,'' Ellis says. ``We've always had tremendous athletes here, great athletic families, with fathers and sons winning state championships. But I think Coach would win anywhere. I'm not so sure if he believes that himself, but I know I believe. That man can coach.''

CONNIE CAMPBELL KNOWS the opportunities have been there, a multitude of chances for her husband to move on and find out for sure.

Soon after Thomas Bunch stepped down after a 2-7 season in 1971, the 24-year-old Campbell took over and had the Devils back on top.

After Campbell's sixth season, when Lincoln County won a second straight state championship in 1977, and had won a state record 38 straight games from 1976-78, he was a hot commodity.

``He's had some unbelievable offers over the years to coach elsewhere,'' Ellis says. ``The thing with him is that he also said he'd never consider a job unless he could bring three or four of his assistants with him, and every job said that he could. So he could have easily left.''

``I'm amazed he's stayed here as long as he has,'' says Lincoln County High principal Richard Freeman. ``Look at other coaches who have had his type of success. They're in high demand, and a lot of schools are willing to pay for that. I know he's had some pretty attractive offers to go elsewhere.''

And Connie knows that, even with all the sacrifices she and their two kids made for the football program, it was her husband who may have made the greatest sacrifice of all.

``There was really only one other job I've ever wanted in all my years of coaching,'' Larry Campbell says. ``I thought it could have been the perfect situation for my family and for me as a coach.''

Elbert County.

``I thought for sure he was going to take the Elberton job,'' Ellis says. ``It was perfect, because it's still close to home. When he turned that one down, I knew he was going to be in Lincolnton for the rest of his career.''

Lincoln County had just won back-to-back championships again in 1989-90 to make it five of the last six Class A titles, and Elbert County, then a Class AAA program about 40 miles north, had an opening for a head coach.

It was everything Campbell wanted. Still close to his hometown of Abbeville, S.C., close to his mother and father. And it's once mighty football program had been struggling in recent years, but still had great backing from the school and the community.

``We were going to Elberton, and I talked him out of it,'' Connie says. ``I take full blame for that. Lincolnton is our home, I couldn't leave. Looking back, I know he really needed the challenge to see if he could have done it somewhere else. He'll never know now, and I feel a lot of guilt because of that.''

Elbert County wanted Campbell, but hired T McFerrin, 14th on the state's all-time list for coaching victories, instead. McFerrin retired after the 1996 season, having led the Blue Devils to the Class AA championship in 1995.

Now, Campbell will never know.

``This program won all these football games and championships, not me,'' Campbell says. ``The support of the community and the administration, they've won football games. These tremendous assistant coaches, the great athletes we've had, they've won football games.

``I don't care who you are, as an athletic director, you're going to make a minimum of 20 people a year mad at you,'' he says. ``Multiply that by 27 years, and you get into a situation where you look back and say maybe I should have moved on.''

SUDDENLY, THOUGH, the challenges are plentiful as ever at Lincoln County, as the part-time horseman and cattle farmer inches closer and closer to the end of his glorious reign.

Times have changed, kids have changed. Football isn't about sacrifice and discipline anymore, it has to be fun now for 16- and 17-year-olds, and coaches have to coddle them a little more.

Used to be you didn't have enough uniforms for every kid who wanted to play. Now, you're strapped for depth, your season hanging by the thread of your star quarterback's torn ACL, or two-way tackle's broken arm. These days, you thank the Lord you can scrape together 35 or 40 willing and able kids to dress out on Friday nights.

``If he practiced these kids now like he did 17 years ago, we wouldn't have half of them around; they'd quit.'' Ellis says. ``He's had to adapt to the generation, and it's been hard, but he has gradually made the adjustment very well. And Larry still puts a winning team on the field each year. That's pretty amazing.''

Lincoln County comes off a 9-2 season, a year termed a major disappointment by the community and the coaching staff after the Devils took an unheard of first-round exit in the state playoffs.

This year, they find themselves facing another obstacle - the possible end to their 13-year run as Region 4-A champions, with the likelihood that a strong Putnam County team might have just enough to kill that remarkable streak.

But next year, that's the capper, perhaps the most monumental football challenge Campbell has ever faced.

With realignment in the Georgia High School Association, powerhouse Class AA schools such as Washington-Wilkes and Lovett will drop to Class A for the 1998 season.

``There's a sense of urgency this year, for Lincoln County and for all Class A schools,'' Campbell says. ``It's not going to be the same again. If we don't win a state championship this year, we may never win one again.''

Funny thing about Campbell, though, is he welcomes the mounting pressure.

``It's going to be more of a challenge to keep this going here than it would have been to go somewhere else and try to win,'' Campbell says. ``It would be very satisfying for me to finish out my career here a winner, then go out to my cow pasture and raise cattle and ride horses.''

MAYBE IF HE COULD just block out the voices that tell him anyone can win at Lincoln County, Larry Campbell, too, would have found nirvana.

``Larry doesn't give himself enough credit,'' Connie Campbell says. ``Everyone knows he is a great football coach, he just needs to believe it more himself.''

Another funny thing about Larry Campbell? He has loved Lincolnton all along, just as much as Connie does.

``When you look at the overall picture, Lincolnton is a unique place to live,'' he says. ``I've been tempted to go to a bigger school for a larger salary, but I really just like to live here. It has everything I want. I could have taken the higher paycheck. But you're not a coach for the money. There are more important things.''

After the 1999 season, he will have served Lincoln County High School for 30 years, 28 as athletic director and head football coach, two as an assistant coach. He says that will likely be it for him, that he will take his retirement.

And though Connie wants him to retire, maybe she can convince that sometimes stubborn country boy of hers to take the Red Devils into the next millennium.

Who knows, that might be long enough for Larry Campbell to catch Pitts, the former Lincolnton High halfback who has won 335 football games, more than any other man in Georgia history.

She does, after all, have some guilt to resolve.

``He has always told me records do not mean anything to him,'' she says. ``But he deserves it, he's the most deserving person I know. Maybe someone can talk him into coaching a little while longer. Maybe he can break that record.''

Maybe then, the redheaded country boy will know for sure.

Larry's ledger