Gray Collegiate’s state championship basketball coach leaving for college job
After building Gray Collegiate Academy into one of the state’s top high school basketball programs, Dion Bethea will give college coaching a try.
Bethea is leaving the War Eagles program to take an assistant coach job at Division I Georgia Southern, a source with knowledge of the move told The State. Bethea was scheduled to inform his team on Monday afternoon.
He will take the spot on Charlie Henry’s GSU staff that was opened when Chris Shumate left for UAB.
Bethea has made no secret in the last few years about his desire to coach in college basketball. He brought the subject up in March after Gray’s latest state championship win over Oceanside Collegiate.
“You all stay tuned; you’re all going to see,” Bethea said. “I think there is a lot of opportunities out there. I’m going to get with my wife, my girls and my agent and my inner circle and see what’s next for Dion and what’s next for Gray as well.”
At Georgia Southern, Bethea will reunite with two of his former Gray players — Avantae Parker and Braylhan Thomas. Parker just finished his first season at Georgia Southern, while Thomas was part of the 2024 recruiting class.
Bethea has been the only coach in Gray program history, going back before the school joined the S.C. High School League in the 2014-15 school year and was eligible for postseason play in 2016-17.
Bethea won 273 games in his career at Gray Collegiate. The War Eagles won 20 or more games in six of Bethea’s last eight years as head coach and won the six Class 2A titles, including the last three in a row.
He has coached several Division I prospects at Gray, including Gatorade Player of the Year Jalek Felton, Juwan Gary, and Tommy Bruner, who led Division I in scoring this year, as well as Thomas and Parker.
This will be the second major coaching change at Gray after football coach and athletic director Adam Holmes resigned in December. Both come ahead of the War Eagles’ leap from Class 2A to 4A for the 2024-25 school year. Gray is among the schools moving up in classification because of the SCHSL’s realignment that factored in an out-of-zone multiplier for the first time.
De’Angelo Bryant has been hired to replace Holmes as football coach and boys soccer coach Kevin Heise is the school’s new athletic director.
Midlands basketball changes
▪ Former Eau Claire standout Jacob “Junior” Laurie was hired as the boys basketball coach at his alma mater. Laurie has spent nine of the last 10 years on Bethea’s staff at Gray. He was also girls coach at C.A. Johnson for one season. Laurie replaces Herbert Hunter, who left to take the South Florence job.
▪ Dreher named Kristen Fortenberry as its new girls basketball coach. Fortenberry replaces Teresa Jones. Fortenberry has previously coached at Ben Lippen and Northside Christian.
