Stewarts Creek promotes Ben Caudill to head football coach

Defense was a strength of a Stewarts Creek football team that went 8-3 and enjoyed the program's best season in 2019.

It's fitting that the defensive coordinator of that team was named the Red Hawks' head coach Friday.

Ben Caudill will take over as the third head coach in the program's history after guiding the Red Hawk defense that allowed just 14 points a contest in 2019.

"I think my familiarity with our locker room and personnel will hopefully lead to an easy transition with the kids," said Caudill, 30. "I'm not naive to the fact that I'll be the third head coach they've had in the last calendar year."

Caudill replaces Bert Browne, who resigned to take a position as an assistant at Tennessee Tech recently after one year with the Red Hawks.

It's the first head coaching job for Caudill, who played at Battle Ground Academy before graduating from Harding University. He has also been an assistant at Oakland and Brentwood High.

He noted former high school coaches Tommy McDaniel, Tim Johnson and Marty Euverard as influences during his career.

"I've been lucky to be around a lot of great head coaches," Caudill said. "(McDaniel, while at Oakland) gave me my first job in Tennessee. Most recently I was with (Ron Crawford) at Brentwood. It's safe to say I'll draw upon every experience I've had, now that I'm in the new role."

Stewarts Creek principal Clark Harrell needed just two weeks to decide Caudill was the best fit for the Red Hawks program.

"Coach Caudill inspires a contagious excitement for achieving excellence," Harrell said. "He is well known for his depth of football knowledge and passion for helping all players succeed at high levels. Under Coach Caudill's leadership, I know we will have our strongest coaching staff and program to date."

Caudill said he still plans on being "hands on" with the program, particularly on the defensive side of the ball.

"Obviously my role is not just to be in charge of the defense moving forward, but the entire team," he said. "I don't want to just manage coaches and be a CEO. I really enjoy the teaching component during practice.

"We have some phenomenal coaches in the building already. We had to train our kids how to win and prepare yourself for the week. We'll just be taking that next step as a program. Hopefully all the heavy lifting is behind us, in that regard. We'll continue to build off the success of last season."

Reach Cecil Joyce at cjoyce@dnj.com or 615-278-5168 and on Twitter @Cecil_Joyce.

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