Savannah Christian hires new athletic director

Greg Phillips has been hired as the new athletic director at Savannah Christian. Phillips comes from Christian Heritage School, where he was the girls basketball coach last season. Prior to that, Phillips was at Mt. Paran for 10 years, with the last seven years in that span as the school's boys basketball coach.

Phillips is set to take over the duties of athletic director on July 1st from Julie Jones, who has served in that role since April of 2019. Jones will continue on as the Raider volleyball coach as she will enter her 27th season at the helm of the program. She is among the all-time winningest coaches in Georgia High School volleyball history with a career record of 769-278.

Phillips, 35, said he will be solely focused on running the Raider athletic program and won't take on any coaching duties in his new job. A graduate of Darlington School in Rome, where he played basketball, football and tennis, Phillips went on to play basketball at Piedmont College before earning his degree at Shorter University.

He'll be working with a well-established athletic program. SCPS finished in third place among Class 3A schools this year in the GADA Director's Cup, which measures success across the board in boys and girls programs. The Raiders won eight region championships, six state titles and five Coach of the Year awards this season, with 12 student athletes signing to play college sports.

"I've been working in high school athletics for 16 years and have had some games with Savannah Christian during that time," Phillips said. "I always came away impressed with how their teams handled themselves — from the coaches on to the players and administrators — so that was one reason I was attracted to this job.

"When I came down to explore the job opportunity, I really like the family feel and the community that's been established here. My wife, Briana, and I have two young girls, so that was another important factor for us."

Phillips said he plans to work to continue to develop the culture for student athletes at SCPS.

"We'll continue to work to build God fearing young men and women who try to serve the lord in everything they do," Phillips said.

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Dewitt Award winners announced

Five winners were recently named as the 2023 recipients of the Dewitt Award as the top public and private 8th grade school athletes in Chatham County.

The awards are presented by the Exchange Club of Savannah.  Eighth-grade student athletes are nominated by their coaches, principals and athletic directors based on athletic and academic achievements, sportsmanship and community service.

This year's winners are Mariah Reid, of Ellis Montessori Academy and Ca'Ron Hall of Rice Creek School as the female and male public school athletes of the year.

The private school winners included Madison Bueno of Hancock Day School, Grace Dare of St. Andrew's and James Mobley IV of Blessed Sacrament.

Reid finished third in the district cross country race, won the 200 meters and high jump at the Chatham County Open, was a volleyball standout and averaged 30 points a game playing for the Beach High junior varsity team, while earning honor roll status in the classroom.

Bueno has led Hancock Day to the middle school finals four times, winning a pair of titles as she has averaged at least 18 points per game each of those years. In soccer, she has helped lead Savannah United to three straight state titles, and led Hancock to the middle school finals this year where they lost on penalty kicks. The high honor roll student is also a track and field standout.

Dare is another high honor roll student athlete. She was the runner up in the SPAL cross country championship, played volleyball and was a member of the Lions JV and varsity basketball teams. The track and field standout is also an accomplished surfer with a number of state and regional accolades in the sport.

Hall is a star football player as a receiver and helped lead his team to the City Championship game. He averaged 22 points per game in basketball this year and is a two-time team MVP. In baseball, he had a .600 batting average and led his team to a second place finish in the county. The honor roll student will attend Benedictine.

Mobley was an honor roll student at Blessed Sacrament who will be attending Calvary Day. He is a standout quarterback who accounted for 26 touchdowns. He also played safety on a squad that didn't allow a touchdown this season en route to an SPAL title.

In basketball he averaged 12 points, six assists and six rebounds for a team that went 13-1 and won the SPAL championship. He hit .611 in baseball and stole 20 bases, and also showed his speed in track where he won an SPAL title in the 100 meters (12.24), while finishing second in the high jump and running a leg with the winning 4x100 team.

2023 Dewitt Award nominees

Bethesda Academy - Jadon Turner

Blessed Sacrament School - Ben Kleinpeter, Caitlin Summerling, Joiner Uhrich

Calvary Day School - AJ Rahal, Caedmon Crunkleton, Cailynn Chapman

Chales E. Ellis School - Will McCarn

Coastal Middle School - June Rectenwald

Hancock Day School - Wiley Chandler, Cullen Dunn, Matt Tift, Wyatt Sherrill, Catharine Ann Whitfield

Hubert Middle School - Kelcey Quarterman, Thomas Williams

Saint Andrew's School - Scarlet Holmes, Jack Kelly

Saint James Elementary School - Emory Doan, Ben Harvey, Emily Ryan

Savannah Country Day School - Olivia Aliotta, Claudia Barrow, Chris Wynn Jr.

Savannah Christian Preparatory School - Jordan Dillon and Charlie Hawkins

STEM Academy - Ronald Dunham, Katelyn Mundy

Tybee Maritime Academy - Maddie Harrell

Savannah High Summer Hoops League Tips off

Tim Jordan will be hosting the Savannah High Summer basketball league starting Monday, June 5, as the dean of Savannah prep basketball is back at one of his favorite events.

The action will be taking place at Savannah High on Monday and Wednesday nights, with games starting at 5, 6 and 7 p.m.

Teams set to play include host Savannah High, Benedictine, Windsor Forest, Beach, Johnson, Woodville-Tompkins, Groves, Savannah Country Day, St. Andrew’s, Jenkins, Bethesda Academy and Bradwell Institute.

Admission is $3 per night and fans will get a chance to see some of the top young players in the city going at it in a relaxed atmosphere.

"I like the Summer League because it's a chance to start building for next year," Jordan said. "And Savannah is a basketball town, so there's some good competition. I think 75 % of our teams were in the playoffs last year, so there will be some good basketball."

Jordan's 26th Annual Hoops School for boys and girls ages 6-14 will be held from June 5-9. Cost is $90 per player.

For more information and to register, visit https://hoopschoolsavannah.weebly.com/.

Dennis Knight covers sports for the Savannah Morning News. Contact him at Dknight@savannahnow.com. Twitter: @DennisKnightSMN

This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Savannah Christian's new athletic director Greg Phillips to start in July