Hometown near Liberty Bowl has special meaning for Mizzou cornerback Christian Holmes

Christian Holmes graduated high school in Atlanta, but the Tigers’ cornerback gets frustrated when people say he’s from Georgia. If that’s the case, he’ll respond, why do they call him Sip?

“I take that really personally,” Holmes said. “I’m a Leland, Mississippi, native, and I’m really proud of where I’m from.”

When Leland hurts, Holmes hurts with it, and it’s been a tough stretch in Leland. Holmes has lost multiple relatives and a family friend during the past year, and the pain has taken its toll on the defensive back. He’s had to mourn the passing of four people from afar.

Prior to MU’s current winter break, Holmes had not been home in more than a year. Last December, when he flew to Greenville, Miss., for his uncle’s funeral, he wasn’t able to visit Leland. He returned to Missouri without spending the night.

Leland is a Mississippi Delta town 140 miles from Memphis, where Holmes’ friends and family will drive to watch him play in the Liberty Bowl Dec. 31. Leland is only 2.1 square miles, roughly the size of Missouri’s campus, and the rich soil lends itself to cotton production. Fewer than 5,000 people call it home.

Holmes says everyone knows each other in Leland. The redshirt sophomore loves his home, but there are reasons he doesn’t visit often: Football keeps him busy, and there’s not a ton to return to.

“Whenever you get an opportunity, you have to make the best of your opportunity,” Leland High football coach Terry Bernard said, “Because we don’t have much to do here.”

After his sophomore year of high school, Holmes left Leland to live with his older brother in Georgia and play football for a bigger program.

By the end of his senior year, Holmes emerged as an All-District player and grabbed the attention of Missouri assistant Ryan Walters. He didn’t have any other Power Five offers, so he committed to MU.

When Holmes signed with the Tigers, the team listed Atlanta as his hometown. That changed by the first game.

The cornerback is from Mississippi, and he’ll correct you if you say otherwise.

As Missouri’s top two cornerbacks, Holmes and junior DeMarkus Acy play all over the football field. But the night before Missouri’s September game against Purdue, they sat still.

In their team hotel room, Holmes had taken a phone call bearing bad news. Marshala King, his 19-year-old cousin, had died in a car accident two weeks earlier. Her funeral was set for the next morning.

The loss made Holmes think back to childhood memories in Leland. As the older cousin, he babysat Marshala on weekends. He remembers her carefree soul and ability to smile, even when something went wrong.

“I really don’t know how she would do it, but I’m trying to learn how to do it,” Holmes said in October. “I know she’d want me to not be so emotional, so I try to live through that.”

Neither he or Acy had much to say the night before the Purdue game, but Holmes appreciated his friend’s presence as they sat on the edge of their beds. Holmes didn’t tell any of his other teammates before kickoff. He didn’t want to interrupt their focus.

At one point after King’s death, Holmes lingered outside coach Barry Odom’s office in Missouri’s training center. Odom invited him inside, and Holmes opened up.

“I didn’t know how to come into practice with a smile on my face,” he said.

Holmes didn’t tell Odom exactly what was going on — he thought the coach had enough on his plate — but said he was struggling. The coach provided positivity. He pointed out things Holmes was doing well on the football field, and the cornerback left in a better state of mind.

“You never know when a moment like that for them is what they need,” Odom said.

A week after the Purdue game, Holmes collected his first career interception against No. 2 Georgia. He dedicated the play to his cousin.

King’s death is one of multiple losses for the Holmes family the past 13 months. Christian’s uncle Cornell died last December at age 58, and Holmes’ father lost a family friend. Recently, when Holmes excitedly called home to say he was visiting Leland over winter break, more bad news dampened his mood: another extended family member had passed away.

“That’s just the neighborhood we come from,” said Kenya Dennis, a former Mizzou cornerback who also attended Leland High School. “It’s been a tough year — tough year — back home.”

Holmes and his Uncle Ron chat on the phone every day, and they talk through the pain. Acy helps, too. The close friends are in a group text with a few other players, and Holmes can message the group when he’s feeling down. He’ll also walk his pit bull, Maddy, whose presence has brought him comfort for eight years.

But as the season wore on, he felt an ache that nothing in Columbia could fix.

“I haven’t been home, so I think that’s why it might be hard for me,” he said Dec. 8. “I haven’t been around my family in so long. Going home for these couple of days will be really impactful for me.”

Night time was often toughest for Holmes. Without the distractions of football practice and school day, he had time alone to think, pray and grieve.

On those nights, Holmes often pulled out a photo album of family pictures. Some of the relatives in the photos have passed away, but Holmes finds solace in their smiles.

“It’s not a sad book at all,” he said.

The photo album shows both the people Holmes loves and the town area he calls home. It’s a place he wants to give back to going forward.

In an upper-level sociology class this fall, Holmes gave his final presentation on the Mississippi Delta. The course focused on social change and development, and Holmes educated a 16-student class about the area’s decreasing population and economic hardships.

“I definitely anticipate bringing money into my community, definitely bringing different programs for children and communities, especially inside the school house,” said Holmes, who is majoring in sociology with a minor in social work.

While living in Georgia, Holmes benefited from the Community in Schools organization, a dropout prevention program in the Atlanta area. CIS provided him with tutors and supported him through the college application process. He would love to bring the organization to his home state.

“He has kids right now looking up to him,” said Timothy Holmes, one of Christian’s coaches at Leland High who is not related to the defensive back. “He’s from Leland, (and) he’s successful, so they admire him. (A school program) would mean a whole lot to that town. It’s something that’s much needed.”

People in Leland have followed Holmes’ career at Mizzou, and many will make the two-hour drive to Memphis for the bowl game. Holmes’ high school coaches plan to buy tickets. Timothy Holmes is working to gather a group of Christian’s former teammates.

But the cornerback didn’t want to wait until New Year’s Eve to see his community, and Odom allowed players to head home for Christmas — earlier than Holmes initially expected. He and Maddy made the 500-mile trek south. He didn’t tell his mom he was coming.

The screen door creaked when Holmes pulled the handle, and Maddy nudged her way inside. The dog startled Christian’s mother, and she shrieked with excitement when she saw who had entered the house.

“Christian!”

She grinned. Her son was finally home.

This story was originally published December 26, 2018 at 12:23 PM with the headline "Hometown near Liberty Bowl has special meaning for Mizzou cornerback Christian Holmes."