Houma Christian High School is a small private school located almost as far down the boot as you can go, in Houma, Louisiana. They started their football program only 15 years ago, but it is on the rise as the team continues to grow and improve under the leadership of Head Coach Jamar Celestine, heading into his 3rd year coaching the Warriors.
Celestine spent several years coaching as a coordinator at 5A contender Terrebonne High School before making the move to his first Head Coaching job here at Houma Christian in 2023. He has made that transition from assistant coach to head coach rather smoothly. In his first season in 2023, he led the Warriors to a 7-4 record, and those 7 wins were the most in any season for the young program.
The Head Coach has a lot of responsibilities people don’t see. It’s not just about the game on Friday – you talk to parents worrying about their kid’s playing time, deal with trainers figuring out if a kid can play on Friday, and have a relationship with the administration. That all falls back on you, so you have to rely on your assistant coaches to help get the kids ready for Friday.
Houma Christian High School (Houma, LA) Head Coach Jamar Celestine
Celestine has put a lot of importance on having assistants around him that share his philosophy for coaching, which is player-first. He has multiple former college football players on his staff, as well as a former college baseball coach who has made the move to coaching football.
I tried to put a staff together that understood the game but also loved kids. You got to love kids before you love x’s and o’s. You got to love the whole kid. They have to have experience teaching guys the fundamentals. Some people think coaching is all about the x’s and o’s, but I don’t like skipping steps.
When you are coaching, you have to love the whole kid. When that kid is finished playing, will they come back and count on you in the future. I pride myself on that, with former kids who played with me at Terrebonne, and I would talk to them and ask them how life is going.
Houma Christian High School (Houma, LA) Head Coach Jamar Celestine
The shift to Houma Christian is not just an adjustment to being a head coach, it’s also a change in the kind of school that Celestine is coaching at. Terrebonne is a public 5A school, among the biggest in the state, and Houma Christian is a 2A school where most players have to play both ways and play multiple sports. It’s also a private school, which adds an additional component to everything.
It’s a Christian School, and I want to set these kids up for success with Christian faith at the center of it. It’s more than just about wins and losses here. That being said, there’s nowhere in the bible that says you can’t win while playing a sport, so I made sure that I brought that in the door.
Houma Christian High School (Houma, LA) Head Coach Jamar Celestine
Coach Celestine also made sure to spotlight a few of the key players for Houma Christian going into this season. He has a pair of skill position players in Samuel Theriot and Brodie Liner, who will be playing both ways for this team and have become a pair of leaders, especially on the defensive side of the ball. Theriot had 9 INTs in the last two seasons, and Liner had 7.
He also pointed out a couple of lineman to keep your eyes on: Colton Michel and Shaun Phillips. Michel is a senior leader of this team and stands at an impressive 6’5″, playing both ways on the line of scrimmage. Philips got solid playing time as an 8th grader last year, and has true college football potential with how much he’s shown at such a young age.
Houma Christian possesses the combination of senior leadership and vibrant youth needed to make big strides as a program this year. It’s a young program, but that just means they have plenty of room to grow. With the strides they have already made in the last two years, it’s easy to believe in them to continue to move in the right direction.
