TALLULAH – Former Vicksburg High assistant football coach Toriano Wells is back in his hometown to try and revive the football fortunes at Madison Parish High School.

Wells replaces 37-year coaching veteran Levi Washington, who retired as the school’s coach in April. Wells, a former McCall High football player, will return to his alma mater, which is now Madison Parish High.

&#8220I’m excited to be back. It’s my dream to be the head coach at the school where I played,” Wells said. &#8220Coach Washington was my high school coach here so its an honor to come back home. But its going to be some tough shoes to fill.”

Wells said he had heard back in April that Washington had decided to retire as the Jaguars’ football coach.

&#8220He wanted to go into administration full time and he’s going to be the principal at the middle school this fall. They (Madison Parish) contacted me and things fell in line. It was an opportunity to become a head football coach and I jumped on it,” Wells said.

Last fall, Wells served as the defensive coordianator for Vicksburg High under coach Alonzo Stevens. Before that he served two seasons as a defensive backs coach. He also was Vicksburg’s head track and field coach for the last three years.

&#8220I have some mixed feelings about leaving Vicksburg High. The kids were great to work with. I would like to have some of those great athletes that I had at Vicksburg here. This is definitely a rebuilding job. But I think we’re off to a good start in getting the program back up to par.”

For the past two seasons, Madison Parish has struggled to a pair of 2-8 records.

&#8220They’ve actually been down for the last several years. A big reason why was the number of kids who were showing up to work during the summer. They were only getting eight or nine kids to come workout in the summer.

&#8220Already this summer, that number has risen to 27 kids. We’re using this summer’s workouts as a way to instill back pride,” Wells said.

Wells said he was glad to have worked for his former college coach in Stevens while at Vicksburg High. Wells played for Stevens at Alcorn State University.

&#8220I learned a lot being under coach Stevens. I hope to finalize my own staff here shortly,” Wells said. &#8220I get six assistants but I’m still going to run my own defense, with some help from my other coaches.”