Local Notes
Coaching News…. Catching up on some area coaching news:
- Laurens HS
- Travis Langford Selected for SCBCA Hall of Fame… Former Laurens Raider as well as Ware Shoals and Hickory Tavern basketball Travis Langford was one of 4 basketball coaches to be selected by the South Carolina Basketball Coaches Association to be inducted into their Hall of Fame this year… Coach Langford coached at Ware shoals in the early 80’s where he was assistant on the boys’ team and later head coach of the girls…. He is mostly remembered for his tenure at Laurens High School… Starting in 1997 his Lady Raider made it to the Upper State Finals 5 consecutive years and again in 2001… His teams also won 5 region titles in 1984, 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2008… The State Championship was also captured by the Raiders in 1998, 1999 and 2001… He was voted the Region Coach of the Year on multiple occasions and won other state-wide awards… He has even came out of retirement a few years ago to help coach basketball at Hickory Tavern for a short period of time… He will be honored by the association on July 23 at their banquet in Greenville… For more information on him and the others who will be inducted that night click here… Congratulations to Coach Langford!
- Daryl Smith Lands in Saluda… As you may or may not recall, former Laurens HS football coach Daryl Smith was named as the head football coach at Thornwell Charter Schools… Also as you may recall, since then Thornwell has decided not to field a varsity football team this upcoming season due to lack of interest… That fact caused Coach Smith to step down as the coach of the Saints… Caught up with him recently and I am glad to report that he is now the defensive coordinator for the Saluda Tigers… That title is one that he held prior to coming to Laurens and when he first came to Laurens… Good Luck to him and the Tigers!
- Thornwell Charter… The Thornwell Saints also made a couple of hires just before the end of the school year so let’s remind you of those.
- Justin Dawkins… Coach Justin Dawkins will be guiding the Saints Boys basketball program this season as he takes over coaching the varsity boys… Dawkins is leaving School District 55 where he has been coaching various levels of basketball where most recently he was the varsity boys’ assistant coach… He also has AAU coaching experience… He has also done well in the classroom as a teacher where he won a Golden Apple Award and the National Citizenship Education Teacher Award in 2023… He will be teaching math and science to grades 4 and 5 at Thornwell… Click here to see the Thornwell announcement.
- Michael Hogan… The Saints will also have a new girls basketball coach this season… Coach Hogan has years of experience mostly in the lower part of the state and some of that was in sports other than basketball… He most recently coached basketball at Fox Creek… He actually began teaching social studies back in February at Thornwell… Good Luck to Coach Hogan and Coach Dawkins!
- Ware Shoals
- Christopher Dodson Hired as AD (Again)… Also recently Christopher Dodson was named the Athletic Director at Ware Sholas HS… As you may or may not recall, Dodson was named as the new Athletic Director and Head Football Coach at Ware Sholas over a year ago but had the AD title removed in May of 2023 because of self-reported violation of SCHSL rules which caused the Hornet football team to suffer sanctions last year… At that time he lost the AD title but continued on as football coach… Chad Roper was hired as the AD and baseball coach… Recently Roper resigned to return to BHP… Because of his work and dedication to the Hornet athletic program over the past year, Coach Dodson had the AD title added back to his job description… Click here for more information about this… Good Luck to him and the Hornets!
Clinton HS
- CHS Athletic Booster Club… It’s not too early to think about joining the CHS Athletic Booster Club for next season… To learn more about the booster club and its benefits, click here… That will carry you to a form where more information is available and you can also print out and use that form to join the booster club… They really do help all the sports put the “Go” in Go Big Red!
College Sports: For any game mentioned below, click on the score for more details if available.
College Football
SEC Football Media Days… Starting Monday and going through Thursday, in Dallas Texas at Omni Hotel, the SEC will be holding its annual Football Media Days where the commissioner and all the football coaches will talk about the upcoming football season where the SEC welcomes Texas and Oklahoma to the conference… The activities will start at 10 am ET and it can be seen on the SEC Network… Monday commissioner Greg Sankey spoke first then coaches from LSU, South Carolina, Ole Miss and Vanderbilt will take center stage… To see not only the schedule for each day click here… Remember the event can be seen live each day on the SEC Network…. If you miss it there, you can also click here where there is a list of the attendees and links to some quotes by each of the.
- Wednesday, 7-17… The teams / coaches that are due to speak today are: Alabama / Kalen DeBoer, Mississippi state / Jeff Lebby, Florida / Billy Napier and Texas / Steve Sarkisian in that order
- Tuesday, 7-16… The teams / coaches that are due to speak today are: Georgia / Kirby Smart, Tennessee / Josh Heupel, Oklahoma / Brent Venables and Missouri / Eli Drinkwitz in that order.
- Shane Beamer… If you would like to hear Shane Beamer’s remarks click here…
Pro Sports: For more information on the game(s) below, click on the scores.
Up Next… The Braves will not be back in action until Friday the 19th when they start a 3-game series with the Cardinals in Atlanta.
- Season Schedule… If you would like to see the Braves season schedule, click here… It should also show where the game will be televised if it is televised.
- Standings… To see the MLB Standings click here… Once you get there you will see the standing by league (American or National) and also by division.
All-Star Game… The 94th MLB All-Star Game was played Tuesday night at 8:00 pm at Globe Life Field the home of the Texas Rangers.
- AL All-Stars 5 – NL All-Stars 3… For you casual MLB fans who missed it last night, the AL All-Starts took a 5-3 win over the NL All-Stars… without going into too many details here, I’ll tell you that the NL took an early 3-0 lead scoring 3 runs in the top of the 3rd inning but that would be all the runs they scored as the AAL came back to take a 5-3 win…. They tied the game in the bottom of the 3rd playing small ball and then had a 2-run homer in the 5th inning which proved to be the winning runs… Click here for details on the game.
Home Run Derby… Now for you casual baseball fans who missed it Monday night, I’ll mention that the Home Run Derby was won last night by the Dodgers outfielder Teoscar Hernandez in a “swing off”… Click here to find out how all the participants did…. For a round by round recap click here… For Braves fans I’ll go ahead and tell you that Marcell Ozuna did not make it out of the first round as he finished with just 16 homeruns in the round.
Greenville Drive…. The Greenville Drive finished out their 6-game series down in Rome, GA with the Emperors over the weekend… As a reminder they had won 2 of the first 3 games.
- Up Next… The Drive now have a 4 day break in action and will not take to the field until Friday 19th when they start a 3-game series with the Bowling Green Hot Rods at Fluor Field.
- Schedule… If you wish to see the Greenville Drive schedule and results of completed games, click here.
- Standings… To see the standings for the South Atlantic League (SAL) click here.
NASCAR
- Ryan Blaney Wins at Pocono… This past Sunday Ryan Blaney won the Cup series race at Pocono picking up his second win of the season… He took the lead on a restart with 44 laps to go and then slowly pulled away from Denny Hamlin who finished second… Pocono just happens to be where Blaney picked up his first Cup Series win in his career… Click here to go to the NASCAR website where there is much more about this including the final race results.
- Standings … Chase Elliott moved up a spot to #1 with 703 points while last week’s leader Kyle Larson is very close behind with 700 points… The rest of the top 5 are Tyler Redick (688), Denny Hamlin (683) and William Byron moved up a spot to # 5 with 646 points… Click here if you would like to see the entire driver standings and once at the NASCAR site you can also click on links to see the standings in Xfinity and Truck Series using tabs in the upper right corner of the posting.
- Schedule This Week… This week the Cup Series, Xfinity Series and Truck races will be at the Indianapolis Speedway… The Truck Series race will be at 8:30pm on Friday, the Xfinity Race will be at 3:30 pm on Saturday and the Cup Series Race will be at 2:30 pm Sunday… All times are Eastern Time… To see the schedule for practices, races and TV viewing click here.
- NASCAR on TV this Week… NASCAR has several things being televised this week including race practices and qualifying, the race itself and assorted other things… To see the TV schedule for each day of the week click here.
This & That:
Basketball Camp…. The LDHS varsity basketball staff and players in association with the City of Laurens Parks and Recreation Department will be conducting a basketball for youth age 9 through 8th grade July 22-25… The camp hours will be from 5:30 pm to 8:00 pm each day… This will be an excellent opportunity for the young player to improve their skills and basketball knowledge form experienced coaches… The first 3 days (Monday-Wednesday) the camp will take place at The Ridge and the last day (Thursday) the action will move to LDHS… You may register for the camp at The Ridge and if you have any questions contact them at 681-7275.
If you have any comments, suggestions, or want to report scores, please contact me via email at: sports@wlbg.com or text me at 864-981-3470.