The NKyTribune is featuring players on each of the 21 high school football teams in Boone, Campbell and Kenton counties leading up to the first games of the 2023 season on Friday, Aug. 18. We will then provide focused coverage of local teams throughout the regular season and into the playoffs.
By Dan Weber
NKyTribune sports reporter
Xavier Campbell wasn’t surprised at our question to one of the Beechwood freshmen behind the football building high above Edgar McNabb Field: “Where’s the varsity practicing?”
“That’s them down on the field,” the freshman said with a nod at the 35-member defending three-time state champion Tigers on the first day of full pads.
“It feels different,” says the senior Campbell, shooting for a state title all four years as a starter. “I can see why we might look different like that … we’re down from 50 a year ago. But we still have some dudes who can lead us to victory.”
One of those “dudes,” the guy his teammates call “X” admits, is the person you’re talking to. He’s gone from a 5-foot-11, 200-pound freshman defensive tackle to defensive end to now a “235-pound, maybe 6-feet tall” defensive captain at middle linebacker.
“I would agree that everyone thinks I’m a leader, but not because I’ve been here so long but because I work so hard,” Campbell says of his fifth varsity year.
Like Mr. Kentucky Football Cameron Hergott two years ago, Campbell took advantage of legislation – unique to Kentucky – that allowed student-athletes to get a do-over year for the season lost to Covid.
So it’s no wonder that when new coach Jay Volker is demonstrating form tackling, the player he chooses for demonstration purposes is Campbell.
“He’s a great coach,” Campbell says after a career under the retired – and beloved – Noel Rash, whose teams won six of their last seven state championship appearances since 2016 – three in Class A, three more in Class 2A. And eight in all in his 17 seasons as head coach of the Fort Mitchell program.
That his team has a chance for a fourth straight title, Campbell says, “is awesome, really special,” not to mention “pretty cool.” He has an offer from Thomas More but he also has set his sights at attracting a D-1 offer from Marshall University for both football and track and field where he’s a record-breaking shot put and discus guy.
“That would really help my mom out,” he says of the financial football aid that could be coming his way.
His individual goal, which only comes after winning another state title, is to become “Northern Kentucky’s Defensive Player of the Year,” he says, which from watching his anticipation, quickness and technique at middle linebacker might not be a reach.
As to the team goal, “I want us to be able to stick together when things get tough.”
Which may be what’s ahead for a team where the numbers are down and none of the “dudes” remind you of Hergott, a once-in-a-lifetime quarterback or Mitchell Berger, who would have been Mr. Kentucky Football last season had he not been hurt in the eighth game. He still led the state in scoring with 20.2 points a game.
“I wouldn’t say we have one like either of those two,” Volker says. “Clay Hayden is more of a drop-back quarterback, but we have a surplus of talent around him.”
Hayden, coming back from surgery for the final 10 games, was on the money, completing 106 of 157 passes (67.5 percent) for 1,822 yards (183 average a game) with 21 TDs against just two INTs.
But they won’t look like a Highlands team where there are a dozen or so 250-pound-plus linemen. “I don’t think we have one,” Volker says. His top lineman, Nicholas Alexander, is just 245.
Running the ball will be sophomore Chase Flaherty, who stepped in for Berger and gained 768 yards with 19 TDs, mostly in his six games as a starter.
“Obviously the winning culture is here,” says Volker, only the fourth Beechwood head football coach in the last 51 years. “Our guys know how to win. I don’t want to fix things that aren’t broken.”
But then there’s this: “It’s a fine line to walk, but I still have to make it mine,” he says of the program now.
Rash thinks the Elder grad and three-year Thomas More captain who comes by way of Oxford Talawanda can handle the challenge.
“I think he’s the right man,” says Rash, who notes that the new coach “knows I’m here for him.”
But some things you can’t completely control, especially in a small school. Like the numbers. “We had 22 seniors last year,” Volker says, a number that’s down by a dozen this year. And just eight sophomores on this team that lost maybe six transfers.
“Every other year,” Volker says of the numbers game. “But we do have 28 freshmen.”
And one of those, like Campbell, who can compete and contribute right away you’ll remember as an eighth-grade varsity center field phenom from the spring – Tyler Fryman. He’s a 6-foot, 170-pound receiver and safety with the kinds of skills and instincts that made him stand out in center and at the plate for the regional champion Beechwood baseball team.
“You can tell he’s special just by the way he approaches things,” Volker says, standing on the school’s brand new turf with the bright red track surrounding it.
BEECHWOOD TIGERS
2022 SEASON: 14-1, won Class 2A state championship.
DISTRICT: Class 2A, District 5 with Bracken County, Carroll County, Gallatin County, Owen County, Walton-Verona.
HEAD COACH: Jay Volker (3-16 in two seasons, first year at Beechwood).
2023 SCHEDULE
Aug. 18 – at McNicholas (Ohio), 7 p.m.
Aug. 25 – at Campbell County, 7 p.m.
Sept. 1 – at Dixie Heights, 7 p.m.
Sept. 8 – SIMON KENTON, 7:30 p.m.
Sept. 15 – COVINGTON CATHOLIC, 7:30 p.m.
Sept. 22 – at Gallatin County, 7 p.m.
Sept. 29 – WALTON-VERONA, 7:30 p.m.
Oct. 6 – OWEN COUNTY, 7:30 p.m.
Oct. 13 – at Carroll County, 7 p.m.
Oct. 20 – BRACKEN COUNTY, 7:30 p.m.
OTHER 2023 PREP FOOTBALL PREVIEWS