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The Kings Motmeain Harald
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_ February 1s, 2001 Section A, Page 6
Grayson named KMHS volleyball coach
By GARY STEWART
Editor of The Herald
Kings Mountain High School
has landed one of the top
coaches in the area to lead its
women’s volleyball program.
Suzanne Grayson, who for
the past 18 years has been
women’s volleyball and softball
coach at Crest High School, will
take over program next fall.
Grayson will finish this
school year at Crest, where she
will lead the Lady Chargers’
softball team in Northwestern
4A Conference competition. She
will join the Mountaineer staff
‘at the beginning of the new
school year. She will teach
physical education.
In 16 years of coaching Crest
volleyball on the 4A level,
Grayson has a 132-44 confer-
ence record and 294-149 overall
mark. Her teams have won
eight conference champi-
onships.
KMHS officials are excited
about having Grayson on
board. KMHS volleyball had
dominated the Southwestern
3A Conference for 16 seasons
before finishing second to R-S
Central last year, and the Lady
Mountaineers have one state ti-
tle to their credit.
“Mrs. Grayson is a tremen-
dous lady,” said KMHS princi-
pal John Yarbro, who coached
with her at Crest and later
served as an assistant principal
at Crest. “Mrs. Grayson has
done a tremendous job with
that program. You can see that
by the wins and losses, but as
far as the total program it is
outstanding. She’s a good per-
son and a tremendous coach.
Her program is second to none.
She's certainly the kind of per-
son you want on your staff.”
Athletic Director Dave
Farquharson echoed those state-
ments:
“We feel real good to get her,”
he said. “I think she’ll come in
and do an excellent job. She’s
very knowledgeable of volley-
ball, she’s a real competitor and
a real hard worker.”
Grayson said she has already
“gone through the emotions” of
leaving Crest and is “excited
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about a new challenge, a new
school and a new opportunity.”
Grayson taught and coached
for six years in Cabarrus
County and two years at Crest
Middle School before taking
over the volleyball and softball
duties at Crest High.
“Our first year in 4A (the old
Tri-County Conference) we
went 0-12 in volleyball,” she re-
called. “The next year we went
9-3 and second place, and that
was pretty exciting.”
Altogether, Crest competed
eight years in the Tri-County
and eight years in the NWC 4A.
In the NWC, Crest, Watauga -
and Freedom have been the vol-
leyball powers, but some of the
Chargers’ best competition
came from its nearby county
non-conference rival, Kings
Mountain.
“They have always been a big
rival,” she said of the
Mountaineers. “And the reason
they’re a rival is because it’s a
quality program. They've al-
ways had a great tradition and I
hope I can continue it.”
Grayson, whose softball team
began practice Monday, said
she hopes to get to Kings
Lady Mountaineers
to host playoff game
Kings Mountain High's wom- * {¥
en’s basketball team will host a
first-round state 3A playoff
game Monday night at 7 p.m. ,
Kings Mountain will be the
second seed from the
Southwestern 3A Conference,
and will host the fifth seed from
the South Piedmont
Conference.
The winner will advance to a
second round road game
against the #2 team from the
Tri-County Conference.
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Mountain sometime this spring
to meet with her players and
develop a summer workout and
camp schedule. Although she
doesn’t know the players indi-
vidually, she knows they have
plenty of talent and said she
looks forward to working with
them.
“I've heard a lot of great
things about them and what
great girls they are,” she said. “I
know they have a lot of talent.
The people I've talked to have
bragged on them a lot.”
Grayson believes the compe-
tition in the newly-formed
Southwestern Foothills
Conference, which KM will join
next season, will be second to
none in volleyball.
“I'm not saying there’s any-
‘thing wrong with the
* Southwestern Conference, but
anyone who knows volleyball
knows that this new conference
is going to be a very tough vol-
leyball conference,” she said.
“Kings Mountain has been first
in the conference every year ex-
cept last year, and their big rival
“is R-S Central. Crest has been
successful in 4A. Fred T. Foard
had three straight state champi-
onships. I don’t know about St.
Stephens and the rest, but even
without them that’s four strong
teams fighting for three playoff
positions. A very good team
won't make the state playoffs.”
Grayson said her coaching
philosophy is not to concentrate
on a particular offense or de-
fense, but to match the person-
nel with a system that works.
“I want to look at what we've
got and adapt the personnel,”
she said. “I believe in working
hard, hustling and playing
hard.”
Grayson, a native of Shelby
and wife of Shelby’s American
Legion baseball coach Mike
Grayson, said she is “flattered”
to be chosen to teach PE. and
coach volleyball at KMHS.
“There's a lot of good young
people out there,” she said. “I
appreciate their confidence in
me.”
She leaves a lot of good mem-
ories and support at Crest, but
is confident she’ll see more of
the same here.
“I feel like I've had the best of
everything,” she said. “I can’t
say enough good things about
Crest. On the one hand, it’s very
Me Hd
SUZANNE GRAYSON
hard to leave. All of this came
up all of a sudden, but I'm the
type that when I've gone
through the struggles and made
a decision I'm good to go.
“I'm excited. I will bring
some experiences with me and
it will be hard to play against
Crest. But when it happens
we'll be all Mounties.”
Coach Kevin Moss is getting his KMHS women’s basketball team ready for the state playoffs,
which begin next Monday.
KM ladies bounce East
from SWC 3A tourney
Kings Mountain High's girls
basketball team put on one of
its most impressive perfor-
mances of the season Monday
night at home in the opening
round of the Southwestern 3A
Conference tournament.
Bouncing back from a disap-
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pointing loss to Burns in the
SWC regular season finale
Friday night, Kevin Moss's
ladies dominated East
Rutherford to the tune of 72-40.
The loss moved the Lady
Mountaineers into a semifinals
game last night at Forestview
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against Burns, a 66-64 winner
over South Point. In the other
semifinals game, North Gaston,
a 59-54 winner over R-S
Central, was slated to play reg-
ular season champion
Forestview. The winners will
meet for the championship
. Friday at 7:30 at R-S Central.
Kings Mountain came out
hot, and never let up in posting
their third win of the season
. over the Lady Cavaliers. KM
held a 20-13 lead after the first
period, then outscored their vis-
itors 21-6 in the second quarter
to take a 41-19 halftime lead.
“I'm glad that we came out
-and played the way we did,”
Coach Moss said. “We needed a
performance like this, because
the last two games we played
sluggish.”
Senior guard Anna Ramey
and sophomore center Shonda
Cole continued their torrid in-
side-outside play. Ramey led
the KM ladies with 21 points,
including 19 over the middle
» two periods. She didn’t score in
the fourth quarter, mainly be-
cause the Mountaineers had the
game in hand and Coach Moss
was working all of his players
into the contest.
_ Cole scored 18 points, includ-
ing 10 in the first quarter and 16
in the first half. Like Ramey, she
spent the fourth quarter on the
bench.
Ashley Leigh chipped in 10
points to give the Mountaineers
three players in double figures.
East Rutherford got the bulk of
its scoring from Teyawna
Hardy, who led all scorers with
22 points. Chanity Watkins
added 10.
KM (72) - Ramey 21, C. Cole 8,
Moore 2, Shonda Cole 18, Leigh
10, Miller 5, Thomas 6, Sherica
Cole 2.
ER (40) - Hardy 22, Watkins 10,
Miller 2, Johnson 4, Joplin 2.
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