Best/Top High School Football Coaches in Guilford County

In our continuing series on high school football in Guilford County and what makes it tick with the off-season currently in place, and with no 7 on 7’s going this week due to the Fourth of July off period, today will look at our high school football coaches over the past 30 years or so, and try and decide who are the best/tops….

Let’s look at some names that jump up to the top of the board quickly….

Marion Kirby(Page High School)….Three State Titles(4-A) and tied for another…..He still owns some rare air and many feel he is up there with Bob Jamieson and Jamieson should probably be installed up at the top too…

Could be a busy Mount Gushmore…..Gonna make many gush as we add more names to the ‘ROCK’…..Mount Gushmore, you gotta like that…

Steven Davis from Dudley High School with back-to-back State Titles on the 3-AA level and then one more this past year(4-A) to go with them….

Coach Johnny Roscoe(Northern Guilford HS) with three straight 3-AA State Titles and he hasn’t been at in the county, as long as the other three(Kirby, Jamieson, Davis), but percentage-wise, Coach Roscoe is right up there with the tops and going for three in a-row, that generates and should rate him up there with the rest of the tops…

The top three living, Kirby, Davis and Roscoe should rate pretty darn high on your charts and there are others that need be on that ‘ROCK’ and it may get a bit interesting the rest of the way….

Are we missing any others that won three or more State Titles in high school football???

Dick Kemp at Ragsdale won two and I think one was a Co-Championship and he won the other outright and they came in back-to-back years/seasons, back around 1973 and 1974…..

At least four names on that Mount Gushmore and do we have more for the ‘ROCK’….And that is four names if we include Coach Jamieson and that is going pretty far back into the past….He is in for now, as we shoot for at least 10 names…

Not sure how many State Titles Herb Goins(High Point Andrews) won, but you get the feeling that he should be able to garner up enough support to get up on that ‘ROCK’….Thinking that Herb won at least two while with the Red Raiders….

If you add Coach Goins, that gives you five men up there on that ‘ROCK’ and what about the rest????

Do you go with Doug Henderson(Western Guilford High School) ??? He was a State Title winner(3-A) back in 1977 and he won I do believe at least 200 games in his career…

That gives us six names and we have room four about four more….

Do you go with only coaches that won State Titles or do you look at longevity and total wins, or do you go for a combined total look?

There was a coach at High Point Central that had a lot of success and I don’t think he was around for a long time, but he may have grabbed a title or two in a hurry with the Black Bison and that would be Ron Krall….Others know more about him???

You can also look at coaches who did not win a title, but they won a ton of games like say a Tommy Norwood(Ragsdale), Tommy Pursley(Northeast Guilford) or even a Bill Slayton(Southeast Guilford High School)…And what about a younger coach, but he has a State Title and has won many games at Page, since he arrived getting closer to 10 years ago and that would be Kevin Gillespie….

Long time/many years at the same school and in some cases two coaches from the same the school….

I have a ten up here and I’ll go more modern day and shoot these ten to the ‘ROCK’ for now:
Kirby
Davis
Roscoe
Kemp
Goins
Henderson
Norwood
Pursley
Slayton
Gillespie……

Should make for a good staring point and we could for sure list more, as we find more time…..

*****Another name that came to my mind as I was driving down the road upon the first rendition of Mount Gushmore/’The ROCK’ was the name of Coach C.K. Siler from Southern Guilford….Did not win a State Title, but he won a lot of games at Sumner/Southern Guilford and they named the stadium for him down there and that ought to account for something, right???

What, we’ve got C.K. Siler Stadium(SG), Bob Jamieson Stadium(Grimsley), Marion Kirby Stadium(Page), Claude Manzi Stadium(Smith), Tarpley Stadium(Dudley), Doug Henderson Stadium(WG), Bill Slayton Stadium(SEG), Kenneth Miller Stadium(Ragsdale), Billings Stadium(NWG), Tommy Grayson Stadium(EG), Johnny Roscoe Stadium(NG), Simeon Stadium(Central and Andrews in High Point), Bill Bookout Stadium(NEG), and not sure about Southwest Guilford HS…..*****

9 thoughts on “Best/Top High School Football Coaches in Guilford County

  1. Another name we are looking for info on this week is James Summers…

    Summers-Page 2011 4-A State Champs
    Summers-Hargrave Military Academy-2012
    Summers-Hinds Community College in Mississippi-2013
    Summers-??? in 2014

  2. HOW ABOUT CLAUDE MANZI AT BEN L SMITH. HE DOMINATED THE GREENSBORO AND GUILFORD COUNTIES SCHOOLS DURING HIS TENURE.

  3. Smith had some beast teams back in the day. HS FB FAN, Didn’t Manzi run the single wing over there?

  4. I’ve seen that formation a lot in youth football. When executed correctly with the right atheletes its virtually unstoppable.

  5. Maybe we need to make a key push for Coach Claude Manzi from Ben L. Smith High School…

  6. From 1992 – 2003 Gary Whitman coached HP Central and won nearly 75% of his games in that tenure. Played in a 3A title game in 1995 finishing State Runner-Ups. And then in 1999 led the Bison to a undefeated season and a 2A Championship.

    And probably his biggest accomplishment was turning the balance of power in High Point Central’s favor in it’s rivalry against T.W Andrews, prior to HPC defeated Andrews the 1995 season in their annual contest. Andrews had won twelve years in a row in this rivalry and had won 13 straight contest if you count the playoffs. In 1995 Whitman and the Bison broke that drought in which Andrews ruled the city for a whole generation. Since 1995 the rivalry has been lopsided but in the favor of HPC.

    Coach Whitman definitely among the best ever in this area.

  7. Had always thought of Whitman as more of a Lexington man than a Central man, but the numbers you are posting are showing his value to the overall HP Central football program…

    Do most think of Coach Gary Whitman as Lexington or High Point Central???

    Just curious…..

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