High school notebook: Lamar County hires football head coach; more signings
Lamar County went up geographically and in classification to find a football head coach.
The school has hired Bryan Love, who went 24-11 in three seasons at Class AAAAAA Westlake, to replace Jamie Abrams.
Abrams resigned in February with a 15-7-1 record in two seasons.
Westlake, the alma mater of NFL MVP Cam Newton, went 5-6 in Love's first season, then followed with 9-2 and 10-3. The Lions lost to Grayson 35-28 in the 2015 quarterfinals and Etowah 23-6 in the second round in 2014.
Last season was only the second 10-win season in the program's history, which started in 1988. The 19-5 mark is the best two-year run at Westlake, just nipping the 18-5 mark in 1998-99 under head coach Dallas Allen.
Love graduated from West Virginia State, and has coached at Spruce Creek, Florida, McEachern, Camden County and Shiloh.
Montgomery County has hires John Bowen, who has coached twice at Glascock County, as well as John Hancock, Hephzibah and Cross Keys. He is 46-140-1 in 19 seasons.
SIGNINGS UPDATE
Two Mary Persons football players will sign letters of intent Thursday morning.
Tight end Will Bazemore is set to attend Samford, a member of the Southern Conference, while quarterback Jake Johnston is headed to Mars Hill, a member of the Division II South Atlantic Conference.
Samford is coached by Macon native Chris Hatcher, and Mars Hill went 6-5 last year and is coached by Tim Clifton, a 1976 graduate of Mercer.
The Lions return Middle Georgians Nicolas Sanders of Washington County, Adrian Bentley of Westside and Tyler Stewart of Upson-Lee. Fitzgerald's Felix Graham was a freshman last season.
Three Howard football players have signed with Reedley College, a junior college in California.
Heading west are quarterback Courvoisier King, defensive lineman Tyjae Lockett and first-team All-Middle Georgia wideout Alphonso Stephens.
Wide receiver and defensive back Kendall Ragin has signed with Stetson.
Jones County offensive lineman River Vaughn has signed with LaGrange, and teammate Andrew Collins with Maryville (Tennessee) College.
Signing information should be sent to sports@macon.com.
ALUMNI UPDATE
The spring training of former Jones County baseball standout Terrance Gore picked up a little oomph earlier this week.
Gore was given the Willie Wilson Award, given to the top base runner in the Kansas City organization. It's not new: this is Gore's fourth time getting the award.
He stole 39 bases last year at Northwest Arkansas.
Said Wilson, according to the Kansas City Star: "It's going to be named after you after a while."
The ceremony included former Kansas City stars George Brett, Dennis Leonard, Frank White and John Mayberry.
Gore is still on the Royals' active roster, currently at 44.
NOTE TO SPRING SPORTS COACHES
The Telegraph will begin a feature this Sunday highlighting the top performances of the week for boys and girls.
Athletics directors will receive information by Thursday afternoon with details to disseminate to all spring sports coaches.
Deadline to nominate top performances to sports@macon.com is noon Saturday.
REMINDER TO SPRING SPORTS COACHES
Coaches and statisticians of spring sports are reminded to email game reports nightly -- within 30 minutes of completion or by 9 p.m. -- to sports@macon.com.
This story was originally published March 16, 2016 at 8:23 PM with the headline "High school notebook: Lamar County hires football head coach; more signings ."