Unlike the three men who preceded him as Troy’s head football coach, Gerad Parker has not previously worked on the Trojans’ staff.

But the former Notre Dame offensive coordinator sees a lot of himself in Troy — the football team, the university and the city. Parker was raised in tiny Louisa, Kentucky, and coached on the high school, FCS and Group of 5 levels before taking his first Power 5 assistant job at Purdue in 2013.

“I am from a small town,” Parker said Tuesday, the day he was introduced as the Trojans’ 24th head football coach. “My wife is from a small town. My mom and dad come from an upbringing where hard is what you want. We were raised tough, raised the right way. When things don’t go your way, you always go back to work. That’s what you’ll find from us.

“We’re going to put our heads down and go to work and find our way there. We will develop, we will graduate our players and we will win championships.”

Parker certainly has lofty standards to live up to at Troy, after Jon Sumrall dominated the Sun Belt Conference in two seasons before taking the Tulane job. Sumrall’s teams went 23-4 with back-to-back Sun Belt championships, including a perfect 14-0 mark against Sun Belt West competition.

Troy has the most Sun Belt Conference championships (8) since the league began sponsoring FBS football in 2001. They are also a perfect 2-0 in the Sun Belt championship game, beating Coastal Carolina in 2022 and Appalachian State this season.

“Troy is winning in every sense of the word,” Parker said. “… One of the questions in the interview process was ‘why Troy and how are you going to handle all this winning?’ And I said, ‘well, that’s a great question, and all I know is this — what better way to become great than to surround yourself around greatness. And that fortunately for me has been my career. … If you want to be great and you want to stand in that fire, you better get around people who are great, places that are great, places that are led great. You better thrive in them, celebrate them.”

The Trojans (11-2) face Duke (7-5) in the Birmingham Bowl on Saturday, but the evidence of their last game still remains. Jubilant students tore down one of the goal posts at Veterans Memorial Stadium following the 49-23 victory over Appalachian State in the league title game Dec. 2.

Parker said when he first toured “The Vet,” he noticed “something’s odd about this place.”

“There’s one field goal post missing,” Parker said. “And it hit me pretty fast. … Is there not a better win way to win and finish a season than making sure that we have a goal post missing every year?

“All we’re gonna do is try to stand in that same success and find better ways of getting there. That’s it. We’re gonna celebrate Troy’s success and I’m so grateful for that.”

The 42-year-old Parker has worked with some of the biggest names in coaching during his career, including David Cutcliffe and James Franklin. He played for Rich Brooks at Kentucky in the early 2000s (where both Sumrall and Neal Brown — Troy’s head coach from 2014-18 — were among his teammates), and also worked as an assistant at UT Martin, Marshall, Purdue, Duke, Penn State and West Virginia before becoming Notre Dame’s offensive coordinator this past season when Tommy Rees left for Alabama.

Parker’s Notre Dame offense averaged 39.1 points per game this season, eighth among FBS programs. Parker said he hopes to bring the same “attacking” style to all three phases of the game at Troy.

“Our defense is going to create havoc,” Parker said. “That word is a powerful word that’s used around here, from what I understand, and that’s the defense we want to keep playing. Our offense is going to be attacking in every way. That’s my mentality. That’s the only way I know how to do it. And that’s what we’ll do on offense, which means we’re going to attack everybody laterally and vertically down the football field. Our special teams is going to be attacking in its own.”

Sumrall resigned on Dec. 8, and Troy athletics director Brent Jones said he vetted more than 50 candidates for the opening before narrowing the initial list to 25. He then interviewed “almost 10″ before settling on Parker.

Jones said the “diversity” of Parker’s background — he has experience in high school, FCS, Group of 5 and Power 5 football — was particularly appealing. He also said the new coach fits in with the tough, blue-collar mentality on which Troy prides itself.

“He has a plan, he has a vision and he has an edge,” Jones said. “He knows what it takes to be at Troy. … He’s a man of strong faith and conviction. He’s been humbled. He’s gone to the highest mountain possible. He’s led through transitions before. … He has energy, passion, connectivity. He is battle-tested and he is ready. He’s gritty and he’s blue-collar. Nothing has been handed to him, just like Troy. We have to fight for every single thing.”