Chris Pedigo spent his six seasons as the head coach at Princeton building the football program brick by brick. It was at times a frustrating process with one and two-win seasons early on but paid off when he guided the Tigers to playoff berths in his final three seasons at the helm.
In the latter part of his tenure he expressed confidence that if he stepped down, his coaching staff would be able to carry on and maintain the standard without him.
This season will be the litmus test for that.
Keith Taylor, one of Pedigo’s assistants and former player at Princeton, was tabbed to replace him in the winter. He looks to build upon the foundation Pedigo laid with a staff and roster that’s different than the one the Tigers fielded in last November.
On top of Pedigo’s departure, defensive coordinator Davon Marion took the head coaching job at Oak Hill. Taylor, like his predecessor believes he has the perfect bunch of coaches to keep the train on the tracks.
“We picked up a lot of young guys,” Taylor said. “Jordan Jones was a heck of a football player here and went on to play at the University of Charleston and Concord so he’s coming on to that secondary role that Marion really did. Marion was an incredible coach that brought incredible energy. He’s going to do great at Oak Hill and I hated to lose him but if we were going to lose him I wanted him to go back home and build that program in an area where he had success. And coach Pedigo did a lot of great things. Brick by Brick, all those little things were things he established.
“Those were his expectations and he took the brunt of it because we weren’t good at the beginning. He really just gave a blue-collar work ethic. Now that we’ve had some success it’s easy for me to hop in because the offensive coordinator is still here and I truly believe Chris Belcher is one of the best offensive minds in football. I’ve got a greta strength and conditioning coach in David Campbell who played at Virginia Tech. We made a run in girls basketball where I’m an assistant so I wasn’t even here until March. With the work those guys did, it’s easy for me to come in and build off of it.”
The early returns have been positive for the new look Tigers. They scrimmaged William Fleming out of Roanoke and had a strong showing in a scrimmages against South Charleston and reigning Class AA champion Independence.
“I’m really glad with how we played against William Fleming in our first scrimmage,” Princeton coach Keith Taylor said. “That’s a tough 5A school that was physical and showed us some things about our kids. We were flying to the football and had a lot of energy and that’s what we’ve seen so far in camp. The first couple of days of practice we got kids to buy into being upbeat and positive. We’ve got music going and the energy is incredible. Coach Pedigo laid an incredible foundation. A lot of people asked what changed and really nothing but a title. These guys know how I am and they’ve bought into it.”
On the personnel side, the Tigers have massive shoes to fill. They graduated a senior class the changed the culture including all-state QB Grant Cochran who threw for over 8,000 yards in his career, running back/linebacker Brodee Rice and linebacker Kham Proffitt.
It’s left an open competition at the spot with sophomores Chance Barker and Brad Mossor splitting reps. The two won’t be without help though. Should Barker win the QB job Mossor will be one of his top targets after a productive freshman season as the No. 2 option in the passing game.
They’ll also benefit from the return of first-team all-staters Eli Campbell (OL) and Dom Collins (WR), who should be Stydahar and Moss Award contenders. Collins broke every single-season receiving record in program history last year with over 1,000 yards and 19 scores while Campbell earned his second consecutive first-team selection.
“With our two QBs right now we’re giving them an opportunity to get it to our playmakers in space,” Taylor said. “We’re not going to be this team that sits back there like Grant and throws it all over the yard. We’ve built our offense the way it’s originally supposed to be designed with a lot of run-pass stuff. Our QBs are incredible athletes and it’s not that Grant wasn’t, it just wasn’t his skillset. We’ve been able to do the exact same things with both QBs and it’s made us multidimensional. We’ve got different guys outside and we’re moving Marquel (Lowe) and Dom (Collins) around. But we know we’ve got to lean on 60 (Campbell) and 5 (Collins). They’re two of the best players in the state and they know they’re going to get everybody’s best.
“We’re trying to get these other guys to rise to the challenge because we know they’re going to get doubled. The best guy is going to be blocking Eli so it gives us a way to gameplan for teams because we know we want to be able to manipulate them with those two guys.”
Replacing the aforementioned starters along with several others lost to graduation will be a difficult task but Taylor’s belief is their offseason work ethic will translate to the field and they’ll improve as they get more reps.
“Those guys and Carter Meechum and Mason Brookman all started last year,” Taylor said. “They started the second half of their freshmen years into their sophomore years. They’ve all been after it in the weight room, so the guys coming in might be young but they’ve already put seven or eight months into the weight room and they’re already gaining more experience. During our first scrimmage we took our top 17 or 18 guys and they played for two hours. We’re in great shape and the standard those seniors set last year, it’s a culture thing because the other guys fall in line.”
The schedule will again be a challenge for the Tigers who will host Hurricane and travel to state runner-up Parkersburg South late in the year. Those games come in addition to rivalry games with Bluefield and a new-look Oak Hill. But challenging themselves was the goal for the Tigers as the various schemes and philosophies pre them for what they hope is a postseason run.
“Offenses change from week to week,” Taylor said. “We lined up with a 5A school that ran nothing but tight end, I-formation pro-style run right at you. Then you’ve got to jump to Hurricane who will spread you out and get the ball out. I think it’s a testament to our coaches who put in work. I’ve got the best staff in West Virginia. We’ve got multiple guys that played at all three levels in college. Almost every one of our coaches have played college ball so picking their brains has made it really easy for us to kind of go out there and put our base stuff together. It’s allowed us to change things a little and we’ll have to do that from week to week just because of how dynamic some of these other teams are.”
Princeton will open the season on Aug. 25 at Lincoln County.
