M.L. King coach on turnaround season: ‘We needed to learn how to win’
Today’s Four Questions interviewee is M.L. King coach Joel Kight, whose team defeated Hiram 47-23 in the Class 4A first round last week. M.L. King (10-1) has achieved its first playoff victory and 10-win season since 2012.
Kight is a former M.L. King linebacker who was the AJC’s Class 5A defensive player of the year in 2007, when M.L. King was amid a 10-year run of averaging 10.2 victories (2003-12). Kight went on to play at Ole Miss.
He has been on M.L. King’s staff since 2017 and became head coach in 2023. This year’s team has avenged five losses from the 2024 team that finished 4-7. M.L. King will play at defending Class 4A champion North Oconee on Friday.
1. What’s better about this year’s team? Did you return lots of players?
“We actually lost some key guys. Our quarterback didn’t come back. Our top wide receiver returned to Florida. A lot of people thought we’d be down, but we’ve had some guys step up. The difference is we’ve just finished this year. We were close on a lot of games last year (losing four games by five points or less). We needed to learn how to win. We’re still learning. We still make mistakes, but our guys want to win. We can see it in practice. They want it.”
2. What’s been the most impactful change that you’ve made since being promoted to head coach in 2023?
“The biggest thing that I did was set the standard high. I challenged them every day. The standard is high, and we’re not lowering it for anybody. The first thing is grades. We do a grade sheet every week, and we do down-ups if you’re not making good grades. Every F is 100 down-ups. Every D is 90. Every C is 80. We do it every week. A lot of it wasn’t that the classes were hard. It was them being lazy. It’s brought up a lot of their grades. That’s how we go about school, practice, the game. We do everything first class and 100%.”
3. How would you describe this year’s team in terms of style, identity?
“It’s a team of rough riders. We think of it as we’re winning with the guys that other coaches didn’t necessarily want. We’re winning with players in the building and showing the world that you can win with guys in this community. MLK started to get a bad rap as far as the school, and I wanted to come back here and change the outlook on our school and the community I grew up in, and I feel these guys are doing that. When you come watch us, you’re going to see a hard-nosed, physical football team that plays for each other.”
4. Who’s your mentor? Who had biggest influence?
“I have a few people to credit. I owe a lot to my dad and brother, just the way they went about things, my brother (former NFL wide receiver Kelvin Kight) as a player and my dad (Jerome Kight) as a father. A coach that really mentored me was Eric Johnson (a former YMCA trainer in DeKalb County when Kight grew up there, a former Tucker and Holy Innocents’ assistant who is now St. Francis’ defensive coordinator).
One thing he taught me about players was they’re not going to be you. I can’t look at them and say, ‘I was able to do that as a player, why can’t you?’ Early on I had to get that out of my mind. It might be simple to me but rocket science to them. I start at a bare minimum. I’m not going to assume you know anything, and we’re going to grow from there.”
About the Author
Todd Holcomb covers high school sports across the state. He rejoined The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in 2025 and has worked with the AJC in varying capacities since 1985. He is a co-founder and editor of Georgia High School Football Daily.
