[TERRY, MS] Down I-55, south of Jackson, MS off of Exit 78 sits the campus of Terry High School. THS is a school of around 1200 students out in the country, serving the students of the Terry and Byram area. The Terry Bulldogs football team is led by head coach, Kris Thigpen. Thigpen is in his third season as head coach and is looking to make a positive impact on the culture of the program.
Thigpen joined the Terry Bulldogs football staff in 2019 as offensive coordinator. That year, the Bulldogs finished with a 2-10 record. Thigpen was given the head football coaching job the following summer. After two seasons marred by Covid, Thigpen finally got the opportunity to coach the team in a normal season. This season, the Bulldogs started the season with a 3-0 record, outsourcing their opponents by a whopping 104-7. As district play began to approach, the Bulldogs began to experience injuries and just some flat out tough losses. Still, Terry has the most wins since 2018, and made school history by defeating Pearl at Ray Rogers Satdium. “Coach Thigpen has done a lot to turn this program around.” Eric Nelson, the offensive coordinator for the Bulldogs, raves. “My favorite part of Thigpen’s style is that he lets us coach. Now he lets us know when changes need to be made. But he’s not a micromanager, and that makes you want to run through a wall for him.”
Kris Thigpen hails from Taylorsville, MS, a small town about a half an hour outside of Laurel, MS. Thigpen was a football star in high school as a quarterback, which led him to Jackson State University on a football scholarship. But not only did he play sports, he also thought sports. “I was a sports fanatic. Even before the internet….by the time I was in the third grade, I knew every starting quarterback in the NFL and where they went to college. I was that dialed in.”
During his time at Jackson State, Thigpen began to get the coaching bug. He started off going into mass communications looking to get into sports commentary. Then his focus shifted toward coaching by the time he left. He went on to finish graduate school at the University of Southern Mississippi.
Upon graduation, Thigpen went to North Forrest High School where he was given a multitude of coaching duties. From quarterbacks coach for football to assistant girls basketball coach even to head boys basketball coach. Thigpen was a busy man at North Forrest. He stayed there for 3 years. From there, he went to Hattiesburg Middle School before getting his big break, working with the highly successful Collins High School football program, headed up by Coach Ryan Earnest. “He kind of helped my career reach new levels.” Thigpen said of Earnest. “He was talented and together we were like the perfect match.”
Thigpen was able to score his first head football coaching job at Coffeeville High School in North Mississippi. “That was a leap of faith…we were living in Oak Grove…we went up and rented a house in Oxford and lived there.” Coffeeville High is a 1A school and it proved to come with growing pains for Thigpen as he was 28 years old coaching the ball club.
He ended up getting on at Ridgeland High School as assistant coach on their football team. This was the job that set him up for the move to Terry. After one season as an assistant, Russum resigned his post in the summer of 2020, during the height of the Coronavirus pandemic. Thigpen was then offered the head coaching role with the Terry Bulldogs.
As has been the case with his whole career, Kris Thigpen has a lot of roles at Terry High School and in the school district. In addition to head coaching the Bulldogs football team, Thigpen is responsible for painting the fields and keeping them watered and green during the season. He also teaches multiple classes as well as driving school buses for the elementary schools in the morning. The Bulldogs coach also runs the Terry Bulldogs instagram account. Along with the freedom he has with ideas, it is also up to him to execute them. Thigpen noted, “I have learned that when you work for somebody, you should always add things to your tool box to add more value to yourself.”
The branding that has become synonymous with Terry High School sports, “South 78”, was originated from Thigpen. Felicia Burse, the vice president of the Touchdown Club, the Terry Bulldogs football booster club commented, “Coach really has a passion for his job. He really cares about helping develop and further these kids. He will send us his idea early in the morning, which lets me know that this is the first thing on his mind.”
In addition to all his work at Terry High School, Thigpen has his own family at home. He and his wife, Michelle, have four children together and live in Byram. During football season, the days are packed in for Thigpen. “I am a workaholic. So I love to get going in the morning and work.”
When asked what his future aspirations are, Thigpen was direct. “I really would like to be a head coach of a college football program….I know I can do it, and that’s what I am striving towards.” With a brother who also works in the schools, Thigpen is at home as a high school head coach at Terry High School. At 35 years old, there is more to this story that has yet to come to pass.
