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Wahconah Regional head football coach Gary Campbell Jr. shows his team how a running play is to be executed during practice yesterday in Dalton. Campbell, 31, is the youngest head football coach in Berkshire County. Saturday, he will be going to his third Super Bowl in six years. Photo by Joel Librizzi.
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Campbell's brash style working in Dalton
Brian Sullivan
Berkshire Eagle Staff
DALTON
You don't have to be the sharpest tool in the shed to understand that Dalton is passionate about its local sports teams.
And why not?
It has a prolific history that dates back decades when young men at the former Dalton High School took apart Berkshire County opposition on the various playing fields.
Dalton, in fact, joins the towns of Adams and Lee in the category of feverish fans who ask for coaching accountability. Win, and the public will wine and dine you -- nary a cent out of your own pocket for a cold beer.
Lose? Well, that's a different matter. Lose often and it's time for the fake mustache and glasses on that trip to the local convenience store.
"If you think about it too much, you're in trouble," said Gary Campbell Jr., who at the young age of 31 will be coaching Wahconah Regional in the Western/Central Mass. Division 2 Super Bowl game at Springfield College on Saturday at 3:15.
Faced with a challenge from Northbridge High School, it will be the third time in his six years that Campbell will lead the Warriors into a Saturday "Super Showdown."
Campbell hasn't had to pay for many beers lately. Wahconah defeated Taconic a couple of weeks back in a showdown game where the winner would advance to the Super Bowl. The Warriors tuned up for the trip to Springfield by knocking off Northampton on Thanksgiving morning.
After an opening loss at Monument Mountain Regional High School in Great Barrington, the Warriors rolled off nine straight wins. Campbell, for the moment, can put the fake mustache and glasses back in the top drawer.
"It's part of the territory," said Campbell, talking about the scrutiny he has received through his six-year tenure as coach. "Somehow, the best coaches always seem to be in the stands. But if you do the job well, then they bring the praise. The highs and lows are amazing."
Certainly that's true in a town like Dalton. Campbell took over the program when he was just 25. But he had a small cushion to fall on -- his father, Gary Campbell Sr., coached 10 years in Dalton and won a Super Bowl title with the Warrior gridders.
The elder Campbell went on to more Super success with the St. Joseph's High School team.
Young Gary watched and learned.
"I saw how my dad needed to have thick skin," Campbell said. I was in the house when phone calls would come from angry parents.
"You've got two choices in a town like Dalton. You can embrace that kind of close attention to your coaching job or you can fight it. And you really have just one choice, because in a small town, you really can't fight it."
Campbell has chosen to embrace his position in town. It's a wise move from someone so young. But he's winning, and that helps. After all, this is a town that drove off its town manager the first time he balked at the party line.
That poor fellow was an outsider, though. Campbell teaches in Dalton at Nessacus Middle School, lives in Dalton and goes out socially in town. If you want to get in his face, he's not hard to find.
"Towns like Dalton, Adams and Lee fulfill much of their identity through their proud sports history," Campbell said. "And it's something that gets passed on. There are people who are born, work and then die in towns like these. These people have visible pride in their athletics."
Gary Sr. was a bruising running back at American International College in the late 1960s. He was also the only married member of the team, having tied the knot with the former Susan Merlet, a classmate at Wahconah Regional.
Younger Gary was barely walking when he first came upon the gridiron. The family moved to Dalton when he was 3. And, while he taught in the Pittsfield Public School System for a time, it was probably not a stretch to assume he would cross the border back into Dalton at some point.
Gary Jr. attended Springfield College and played football a bit. He was a quarterback primarily, but he didn't get his dad's size. He was a slight 5 feet 9 inches, 150 pounds and, at the Division 2 level of play, that can be trouble.
He had his bell rung on more than one occasion.
While in college, he did some scouting for his dad prior to a Warrior Super Bowl appearance. Something clicked, and a coaching career was born.
After graduation, he assisted Dan Sullivan at Taconic for a couple of years and then helped his dad at Pittsfield High. When Tom Callahan became principal at Wahconah Regional, he had to step down from the head football coaching position.
Exit Tom, enter young Gary.
"Honestly, I had no plans for any kind of a glory comeback to Dalton to coach," Campbell said. "I actually thought I would remain as a teacher and coach in the Pittsfield school system."
Campbell learned the highs and lows quickly in his first year. He beat Hoosac Valley and its legendary coach Joe Alcaro in his first game.
"I was on a Mount Everett high," he said.
The next week was a loss to Mount Greylock and its legendary coach John Allen.
"I was lower than the bottom of the Amazon River," Campbell said.
Soon to follow were the native sons, who weren't shy about telling the young coach what he should and shouldn't be doing on the football field.
"Because you're from town, people feel they know you," he said. "I guess that's why it's so easy to call."
Campbell has his critics -- what coach doesn't? Some say he's a bit arrogant. And even Campbell admits that he wears a small chip on his shoulder, at least on the field.
But he defends the attitude he carries.
"Maybe I've got little man's disease," he said. "But you can't back down. Yes, we have captains and stuff like that. But the coach is the true leader of the team. If you back down, then the players may not follow you."
Campbell said he believes his coaching style is one part his dad's and another equal part his.
It's a mix that he said "has been working so far."
He also leaves the coaching hat at the front door. Inside his Dalton home are his wife, Kellie, and sons, Tanner and Dane, who are 2 and 3, respectively.
Home then is where the coach gets humbled. He probably has to get out of the easy chair to get his own beer. But on the streets of Dalton, the coach right now is king. The wave he's riding right now is pretty high.
But how much of his own hard-earned cash he spends at Jacob's Restaurant this winter will depend on Saturday.
That's the way life goes in a habitat like Dalton. But the coach is a townie, and that gives him a leg up.
That's why for now Campbell is a perfect fit for the job.
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