PASCO COUNTY, Fla — The Anclote High School football team is doing something special this year to honor the school's assistant principal and the father of one of their coaches.
The name Caldwell is very familiar around the Sharks campus.
Connor is one of the football coaches at Anclote high, but his main job is off-campus.
“So I am a youth pastor at First United Methodist Church in Tarpon Springs,” he told Spectrum Sports 360's Katya Guillaume.
One thing he always wanted to do was work with teens.
“When I was a youth pastor in Orlando," he said, "I just had a very strong connection with teens and seeing what I can do and shape their lives and how people did for me and so by doing that when I moved back over here and started a 9-5 job, I was like I had to get an opportunity to be a coach somehow,” that’s what he’s doing every day.
On the football field, The Sharks are looking for a breakthrough this year — coming off a 1-8 2021 season.
Coaching his team through drills, Caldwell said, “Every time we let them get away with something, being lazy, that’s giving the other team another 7 points, so if we can do the little things right in practice, the only way that we’ll lose is if the other team has more talent.”
He knows a thing or two about hardship, adversity, and tough times.
If you look closely at the team's helmet, you see these two cancer ribbons — representing breast and lung cancer.
“Yeah everybody has one on the back there on both sides,” Caldwell said.
This is new for the team this year, honoring their principal and someone close to Caldwell — his dad, Dillard Caldwell, is currently battling stage 4 lung cancer.
“For me this is just a reminder that like it’s not over and people are thinking about him, praying about him," he said. "I know for some of the kids, like one of our students, one of our players his aunt has breast cancer so he was really excited that he got to do that.”
Dillard was diagnosed at the end of last school year, and his office has sat empty most of this year.
Connor said his dad is the longest-tenured Anclote employee on campus — he’s made an impact on not just him and his siblings but students on this campus as well.
Connor continued to say, “Every time we’re out in public with him, he’ll see a former student and they’ll come up and say hi and say how they miss him and thank him for how he’s impacted their life and gotten them on a straighten arrow.”
That’s where he got his love for wanting to make an impact, from his father.
Connor advised Spectrum Bay News 9 that his father is doing well through his treatment and the plan is for him to return to his office soon.
The Caldwell family has created a GoFundMe account and appreciates the support.
GoFundMe.com, or any other third-party online fundraiser, is not managed by Spectrum Bay News 9. For more information on how GoFundMe works and its rules, visit http://www.gofundme.com/safety.