The 'father' of Guilford's football family, Mike
Ketchum '78 enters his 11th season as head coach of his alma mater's
football team. Also Guilford's director of athletics for the past five years, he offers a
unique perspective into the experience of Guilford student-athletes, coaches and
administrators. His insight and desire for a family atmosphere help Guilford
student-athletes discover the success he found as a student and coach.
As a student-athlete, Ketchum captained Guilford's football team and received the school’s highest athletic honor. As an assistant coach, he worked with an NAIA national championship team in 1986 and a Gator Bowl winner three years earlier. After 10 seasons as Guilford’s 22nd head coach, the 1978 Guilford graduate stands second on the school’s career coaching victories list with a 43-55 record. Only his predecessor, Charles Forbes, and Bob Doak served more seasons as the Quakers’ football coach.
Two Old Dominion Athletic Conference (ODAC) Coach of the Year plaques hang in Ketchum’s office, testaments of his ability to build champions at Guilford. He received the awards by a vote of the league’s head coaches after guiding the Quakers to conference titles in 1991 and 1997. Both championship teams won a school-record eight games and are two of the four 8-2 units to which Ketchum has contributed. The 1994 club that went 8-2 spent most of the season ranked among the top teams in the NCAA Division III South Region and featured David Heggie ‘98, the ODAC's Player of the Year.
Under Ketchum's direction, Guilford student-athletes have amassed five All-America football honors and 58 all-conference football selections. In 1999, Jimmy Lamour '00 became Guilford’s first participant in the Aztec Bowl, an all-star game between Division III seniors and Mexican college players.
Ketchum implemented the one-back offense that set 34 school records in 1997 and helped Junior Lord become just the second four-time first team All-ODAC football player in league’s history. The holder of 10 school records and five ODAC marks, Lord became the first Ketchum-coached Guilford player to sign with the National Football League in 1998.
Ketchum started his Guilford career in 1974 as a freshman lineman from Cocoa, FL, on Coach Dennis Haglan’s Poultry Bowl-winning team. He blocked for two-time All-America running back Reggie Kenan ‘77, the Quakers’ all-time leading rusher, and played with four other All-America selections during his career. Ketchum captained the grid squad as a senior and earned its Best Defensive Player Award in 1976 and 1977. Also a thrower on the track team, he won the 1977 Nereus C. English Award, Guilford’s highest honor for athletic leadership and ability.
After earning a bachelor’s degree in business administration in 1978, Ketchum coached scholastic football in Florida before accepting a graduate assistant coaching position at the University of Florida in 1983. While pursuing a master’s degree in administration and supervision of education, Ketchum coached tight ends and the Lomas Brown-led offensive line for Coach Charley Pell’s Gators. In his two seasons at Florida, he worked alongside Mike Shanahan, head coach of the Denver Broncos, and Galen Hall, the former Florida head coach who directed the Rhein Fire to the 1998 and 2000 NFL Europe league titles.
From Florida, Ketchum moved to Carson-Newman College where he coached the Eagles’ offensive and defensive lines from 1985-88. Now a NCAA Division II powerhouse, Carson-Newman captured the NAIA national crown in 1986 and finished second in 1987.
Ketchum returned to his alma mater in 1988 as the offensive line coach under Forbes, Guilford’s career coaching victory leader. Ketchum served as defensive coordinator in 1990 and assumed head-coaching duties a year later when Forbes left to coach Division II Lenoir-Rhyne.
In 1996, Ketchum served as the interim director of athletics for the college in 1996 and assumed the role permanently in May 1997. As athletics director, he oversees the operation of the college's 12-sport Division III program and has played a key role in increasing the department's prominence in campus planning. The department has produced five ODAC championship teams, 12 All-Americans and three academic All-Americans in Ketchum's tenure.
A native of Huntington, WV, Mike and his wife, Belinda, live in Greensboro with their two children, Matt and Lilly.
Calvin Hunter is back
on the Quakers’ sidelines for a fifth season as an assistant coach and his ninth
overall. One of the top football players in school history, Hunter serves as an
administrative assistant in 1999 after spending the past two years Guilford’s
offensive coordinator and receivers coach.
Hunter concluded a brilliant playing career at Guilford in 1991 by leading the Quakers to a school-record eight victories and their first ODAC title as a standout quarterback. The Greenville, NC, native earned the 1991 ODAC Player of the Year Award and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in business and 13 individual school records. He still holds the Guilford standards for rushing touchdowns in a game (3) and season (8).
Hunter received his master’s degree in sport management from Georgia Southern University in 1994 and assisted the Quakers in the fall of the same year. Before returning to Guilford, Hunter coached the quarterbacks and receivers at Division II Lenoir-Rhyne College under one of his former Guilford head coaches, Charles Forbes, from 1995-96.
Hunter met high expectations upon his return to Guilford in 1997 after contributing to school-record 8-2 campaigns in 1991 and 1994. He didn’t disappoint as the Quakers posted eight victories and captured a share of the league crown. Guilford’s offense flourished under Hunter's direction as the team set or ties 33 individual, season or career school records.
Hunter and his wife, Tiffany, live in Greensboro with their newborn son, Logan.
