Chip off the old block: Michael Courville following in father’s footsteps, named head coach at Teurlings Catholic

by: William Weathers // GeauxPreps.com Contributor

When his father Tony was an assistant coach at Carencro High School, a younger Mike Courville remembered crying at the thought of getting left at home while his dad went to workouts.

Michael Courville’s grown up in the profession since then, joining forces with his father at Carencro and serving as his defensive coordinator when the Bears won the school’s second state championship in 2020. 

A year after Tony Courville retired Feb. 2024 after coaching for more than three decades, Michael Courville will become a head coach for the first time, returning to his alma mater Teurlings Catholic the school announced Friday.

“It’s super appealing to take a job to go home and go to your alma mater,” said Michael Courville, the defensive backs coach/special teams coordinator this past season at Catholic High of Baton Rouge. “I took my time in considering applying. If anything, this was the one job that would take me away from Catholic. I really love Catholic. I was fortunate to get an interview. I felt I did a good job with it.”

Courville, 29, will complete his teaching duties at Catholic High. Following the Mardi Gras holiday, he plans to visit Teurlings in the afternoon to begin meeting his players, establishing relationships, and building a rapport.

Courville replaces Dane Charpentier who resigned after seven years at the school to become offensive coordinator at East Ascension. The Rebels were 65-32 during Charpentier’s tenure, including a 10-2 record and appearance in the Division I select state quarterfinals last season.

“Most chances you get to be the head coach, you’re inheriting something that’s really bad and this is certainly not the case,” Courville said. “The foundation’s been laid. Both Charpentiers (Sonny and Dane) ran a top, high-quality program for the past 30 years. 

“I want to come in with a lot of knowledge from Carencro, and a different type of blueprint from Catholic, to hopefully be able to take it to that next step,” Courville said. “There will be some fine-tuning of some things here and there. I want to do my best to try and identify some things we can improve and hit the ground running.”

Courville played for Sonny Charpentier at Teurlings where he graduated in 2014 and UL-Lafayette in ’18. The elder Charpentier kick-started Courville’s coaching career which consisted of work with the team’s freshmen, offensive line, and defense in 2015-16.

“Coach Sonny wanted to best prepare me to know the game,” said Courville, who was a walk-on at UL-Lafayette. “He gave me an opportunity to coach while in college.” 

That set the stage for Courville to join his father’s staff at Carencro between ’17-23. The Bears, who won the first state championship in Lafayette Parish history in 1992 when Tony Courville was an assistant to Mac Barousse in 1992, went 12-1 and defeated Karr 35-19 for the Class 4A state title.

Michael Courville was Carencro’s defensive coordinator for four years, a stint that also included a state semifinal appearance. He left to join Hudson Fuller’s staff at Catholic High, and the Bears went 12-1 with a 21-19 loss to eventual state champion Karr in the semifinal round.

“I’ve been coaching at two of the more blueblood-type programs in Louisiana,” Courville said. “Catholic has arguably been the most dominant program the last decade, and we were able to build it back up at Carencro to be state champions and a semifinalist.

“I felt we kind of revitalized that program and that was a good experience for me,” Courville said. “At one point it was the most successful four years of Carencro football. Having the experience of building a program back to where it would be viewed as a state power and then coming to Catholic prepared me for this next step.”

Courville said he also benefitted from his experience around former Teurlings defensive coordinator Mike Doherty, and time around former Acadiana High’s four-time state championship coach Ted Davidson. 

“My dad’s been there every step of the football journey,” he said. “I would still expect him to be a big resource and to help moving forward. Coach Fuller has been nothing but awesome to me. He’s taught me so much about organization and tempo and how to run a practice. Coach Doherty had a huge influence on me, and coach Davidson showed me as a youngster what it’s (successful head coach) supposed to look like.”

With most of his career spent on defense and special teams, Courville is a firm believer in being able to run the football. During Carencro’s state championship run in ’20, he said the Bears ran 90% out of the veer, but his latest experience with Fuller at Catholic has enlightened him to the spread and operating with tempo and trying to outnumber opponents.

“When I get to know the kids and the personnel that we have,” Courville said, “I can make more of a determination of what’s going to be the best for Teurlings in 2025.”