Bill Meldrum is doing his homework.

Starting his first season as football coach at New Haven, Meldrum built most of his resume at Catholic League schools like Notre Dame Prep and U-D Jesuit.

He also was an assistant at Berkley under head coach Jim MacDougall.

Meldrum, a Macomb Township resident, is catching up on the history of athletics in general and football in particular at New Haven.

He knows of the Rockets’ success in boys track, in which New Haven won state Class C team championships in 1994, 1995 and 1996.

He knows about the Rockets’ boys basketball team that last season advanced to the state quarterfinals with a relatively young roster.

And he knows how significant a winning football program would be to the village.

“This is small-town Macomb County; Friday night football is what they want to do,” Meldrum said.

“The community is hungry as heck to get this thing back. The neat thing is that this is not a program that has never had success. They were in the playoffs with coach (Jason) Byers. A lot of these (current players) can remember that.”

New Haven made two playoff appearances under Byers, who is in his first season as head coach at Anchor Bay, in 2004 and 2005. The Rockets went to the playoffs in 2006 under coach Todd Koehn.

New Haven won Southern Thumb Association championships in 1989, 1984 and 1973.

One of the especially proud eras of Rockets football was the 1960s when Ward Young, for whom New Haven’s field is named, was the coach.

The Rockets were STA champions four times in the decade, an accomplishment that’s important today, Meldrum said.

“That’s still a tradition that people can talk about,” he said. “It’s important to have that type of tradition.

“Maybe it doesn’t mean a lot to these guys that we’re coaching now, but their dads and their uncles and grandparents remember that stuff.”

Before he began the process of applying and interviewing for the New Haven job, Meldrum’s last visit to New Haven came when he was on the Berkley staff. He scouted a potential opponent that was playing the Rockets.

At the time, New Haven played on a field behind its old high school.

Since then, the Rockets have moved to a new athletic complex, one that includes baseball and softball diamonds, behind their current high school building.

“Seeing what they’ve done with the facilities here is really impressive,” Meldrum said.