With a new season for the football Bears comes new changes to the coaching staff. The biggest change being at Head Coach, Coach Mark Kelley takes over the Sylvan Hills High School football team as the brand new Head Coach heading into the 2025 football season.
For a little bit of background, Coach Kelly has been coaching for over a decade with 16 seasons of coaching experience. He first started out at Ouachita Baptist for two years as the wide receivers Coach. Then he was at Crosset as an offensive coordinator for one year, followed by another year as head coach. He then moved over to Searcy for two years as offensive coordinator before becoming head coach for five more years there. In his most recent position he was the offensive coordinator at Conway for five years.
We asked Coach Kelley why he chose Sylvan Hills, and why he chose to come lead this group of kids. “Everyone that I talked with felt like Sylvan Hills was a place that had a ton of potential. After being here, I know that they were giving me good advice. We have a ton of potential to be a great program,” Kelley said.
When asked what he wants to bring to the players, he said he wants to give the guys confidence in setbacks and tough situations. “No football game is perfect and we have to keep competing when things don’t go our way,” Kelley said.
Kelley then explained what culture is and the type of culture he wants to bring to the team. “Culture is the actions you encourage to happen in your program. We are setting a culture of accountability to each other and of doing tough things. If you are a tough team and everyone knows they have to do their job you can win lots of football games,” Kelley explained.
Coach Kelley wants to see these kids succeed, and he believes that they have the potential to do it. Under his coaching, we can expect a football team that gives each other confidence to overcome struggles and a team that holds each other accountable to continue to grow together and reach that potential.
We also asked Coach Kelly how we would describe these players going into the season, and in response he said that they are hungry and want to have success this year.
Coach Kelley’s goal is to have a home playoff game and to show that they were competitive in every game this season.
Coach Kelley believes in these players, and he sees the potential in his team. He believes this team has put in the work and is hungry for success.
The Bears kick off the season Thursday, August 28 at home versus the Maumelle Hornets at 7:00pm. The dress-up theme for the game is Hawaiian.
