Gray Collegiate head football coach suspended over recruiting violation
Gray Collegiate will be without head football coach D’Angelo Bryant for the rest of the season.
The S.C. High School League’s executive committee voted 10-5 Wednesday to suspend Bryant and an assistant coach for the rest of the year for a violation of the league’s rules on recruiting.
Gray also was fined $2,500 and placed on warning status for one year. They will be allowed to participate in the state playoffs. Bryant’s suspension includes the regular season and the postseason.
“We recognize recruiting as unsportsmanlike conduct,” SCHSL commissioner Jerome Singleton said. “It’s probably one of the most egregious violations a school can make.”
The War Eagles still have one more chance to get the ruling overturned. The school can — and is expected to — appeal the decision to the league’s appellate panel in the coming days.
The case involved a middle school athlete who was accepted at Gray Collegiate in July and was enrolled for a couple of weeks in August. The athlete withdrew from Gray and was then deemed ineligible to play sports when he tried to go back to his original middle school.
Gray testified that the student, who was set to be a member of the junior varsity football team, never practiced or played with the War Eagles. They also said Bryant wasn’t even the head coach when the student and his family began showing interest in November at one of Gray’s “Lunch and Learn” sessions for prospective students.
Bryant was hired in February and replaced Adam Holmes, who resigned in December after leading the War Eagles to two championship appearances and the 2021 state title. He was previously the head coach at his alma mater Silver Bluff, where he went 38-24 in six seasons with one losing year and trip to the 2021 Class 2A championship game.
Gray Collegiate is currently 6-2 and tied for first place in Region 4-4A with North Augusta. The War Eagles are scheduled to play Gilbert on Friday night.
Assistants Howie Bayer and Treigh Sullivan will be the co-interim coaches for the remainder of the season, the school announced.
The High School League presented evidence of communication where the two Gray coaches said the student would be “a good fit” for the school’s football, track and swim programs. Per the league testimony, that correspondence was followed by the student coming off Gray’s wait list shortly afterward and being accepted for the 2024-25 school year.
“It appeared that the reason he was a great fit is because he was an athlete. It does look like he got preferential treatment on the wait list because he was an athlete,” committee member Kathy Hipp said.
Gray Collegiate and the executive committee didn’t immediately address a second violation for an ineligible player.
An original motion for the recruiting violation, which was a $500 fine and a ban for the rest of the season and the playoffs, was voted down, 11-3. Committee members that voted against the original motion had a problem with banning the team from the playoffs because the violation didn’t involve this year’s varsity team.
“I’m torn on this one,” executive committee president Nicholas Pearson said. “Don’t want to do anything to punish student-athletes when adults made decisions to make this happen.”
Marlboro County football banned from postseason
Gray wasn’t he only school with an appeal Wednesday.
The SCHSL executive committee voted 13-0 in favor of upholding ineligible player sanctions against the Marlboro County football team. The Bulldogs will have to forfeit all six of their wins and are ineligible for the Class 3A playoffs.
The league said the players in question didn’t make a bonafide move in their cases. Marlboro County submitted a 95-page document just prior to the appeal that had new information. But it was deemed that at least one of the players was ineligible, so there wasn’t a need to reconvene for another meeting on the others.
Marlboro County district superintendent announced Wednesday night they will make final appeal to the SCHSL’s appellate panel.
If they choose not to appeal, the Region 5-3A standings would be Loris, Dillon, Waccamaw, Aynor and Georgetown.
It wasn’t immediately known if Marlboro would play its season finale Friday against Waccamaw.
Marlboro County football was appealing sanctions from the reported use of eight ineligible players.
The Bulldogs had several players transfer in from Clinton High School in North Carolina, where head Cory Johnson was hired from in March. Marlboro County was 6-2 on the season and had clinched a playoff spot.
It was pointed out in the testimony that some of the players enrolled at the school in early March, days after Johnson was hired.
Marlboro County was made aware of sanctions last Friday. The school canceled its game against Loris but WPDE reported that Marlboro County said that the game cancellation was because of electrical issues at the home football stadium.
This story was originally published October 30, 2024 at 12:23 PM.
