Coach pushes girls to branch out, winning 2 titles
Augusta Christian girls track coach Bryan Wilson might be the smartest coach in America.
Augusta Christian's Jordan Little (from left) won the state shot put title, Howard Walls won the hurdles title and Casey Brush won the discus title. Little and Brush won their titles in field events they had never tried in competition after coach Bryan Wilson switched them.
Photo by Jonathan Heeter
Wilson, the South Carolina Independent Coaches Association Region 3-AAA Coach of the Year, made a midseason switch that ended up netting ACS two individual state champions and helping the Lions finish as the state runners-up in their first season in the association.
Wilson moved Jordan Little and Casey Brush into field events that they had never tried and the result was state titles.
Little, an all-county basketball player and member of the softball and volleyball teams, won the state title in the shot put with a throw of 32-03.
"I had no idea I had a shot to win a state title," Little said. "I didn't think I would do that good."
Little said Wilson moved her to the shot put with about three meets remaining in the season.
"He just came up to me and said, 'I think you can probably throw the shot for us,'" she said. "I guess it was a great move on his part."
Little said she expected to contend in the long jump, where she finished second, and the triple jump, where she finished fifth.
Brush received a similar suggestion from Wilson.
Brush's specialty was the high jump, where she finished third, but Wilson asked her to add the discus to her schedule after spring break.
She won the state title with a throw of 102-10.
The boys team, which finished third in the state, also had an individual state championship in the 110-meter hurdles.
Howard Walls, who recently signed a track and field letter of intent with Embry Riddle, won his second straight state championship in the hurdles.
Walls' time of 15.03 was nearly three seconds faster than the second-place finisher, teammate Fred Auston.