Lakeway Christian Academy, a new private school near Morristown, created quite the buzz this past spring, seemingly getting any coach it wanted to head up its sports programs.
Bruce Fowler, a former head coach at Furman, was named football coach and athletics director. Curtis Staples, the NCAA’s former all-time 3-point leader (413) from Virginia, took the boys’ basketball job.
And then, Lakeway announced the hiring of Randy Coffman as the girls’ basketball coach. Coffman was 102-5 in three seasons at Riverdale, where he won three consecutive Class AAA state titles and was named Naismith Girls’ Coach of the Year in 2017 after the Lady Warriors finished No. 1 in the country.
Not only did Lakeway get Coffman, but Grainger girls coach Justin Combs joined Coffman’s staff. Combs won 227 games in nine seasons at Grainger, leading the team to four state tournament appearances.
The exclamation mark came in early September, when Division I recruit Dante Harris of Alcoa announced on Twitter that he was transferring to Lakeway Christian to finish out his prep career. Six months earlier, Harris had helped lead Alcoa to a Class AA state-tournament appearance and picked up five Division I offers in the offseason.
Having coached Harris for roughly four months now, Staples called Harris “the best point guard in the state.” You’ll see that in the videos below.
Nevertheless, we’re all still learning about Lakeway Christian: what it looks like now, when the new campus will make its debut, what its basketball plans are for the future — TSSAA or Independent — and what their teams look like now.
So we at 5Star Preps went up to see the Lions and Lady Lions on Friday night in Powell, as they played at First Baptist Academy.
Our first segment in this Video Feature is with Harris, looking at different aspects of his game and an interview about his decision to transfer to Lakeway.
Segment 2 of our Video Feature is with Coffman, who discussed where the Lady Lions are currently as a program, their goals for the season, the possible future for the program and his staff.
The final segment is with Staples, as we discussed his team, Harris’ development, Lakeway’s future, his time in Tennessee and his coach-player relationship with Harris.