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Mangum Still “Focused” On Success After 38 Years At Central High 

By Billy G. Baker

Publisher

Pageland—Joey Mangum has spent the past 38 years as an employee of the tradition rich Central High Eagle athletic program and for the past eight years he has served as the head football coach and athletic director at his alma mater.

The football program has enjoyed back-to-back Class AA state runner-up seasons and this year’s team is also expected to be a contender as well.

With realignment, Central will be facing most opponents no more than 45 minutes away, an improvement on having to travel to numerous schools in the Columbia area in recent years. “In football the travel was not that big of an issue but in basketball and other sports making three trips to Columbia in one week was really tough,” said Coach Mangum. “The other problem was when you go on the road, and it is a long trip, you don’t have many fans following your team. Then when they come up here you are not going to take up that much money from their fans at the gate either. Thank goodness we are in a region with the teams closer together.”

This year some of the Eagle home football games will be against Chesterfield, Andrew Jackson, Chester, Lewisville, and new region foe Buford located just a few miles from Pageland. The furthest region games for the Eagles this year will be at Lee Central in Bishopville and Indian Land in Lancaster County. 

The Eagle varsity coaching staff will once be headed up by some of the hardest working coaches in South Carolina. Mitch Laird returns for his 16th season as head baseball coach while Kevin Thurman will begin his 11th year as the girl’s softball coach. William Kelty will start his 6th season as the boy’s basketball coach and Rhonda Wallace will once again coach the girl’s basketball team.

One of the 20 year veterans in the Eagle athletic program is volleyball coach Ellen Middleton. Wanda Byrd and Janet Mangum do an excellent job coaching the varsity cheerleading team.  Bryan Atkinson will start his 5th season coaching cross country at central and highly successful golf coach Chuck Hartman returns fresh off his fourth AA golf state title.

The wrestling program, started three years ago, made great strides this past winter under the direction of Jim Baxley. Coach Atkinson will also coach boy’s track and field and Bill Blakeney will handle duties with the girl’s track program. 

Two coaches have left the program and have been replaced. Former football defensive co-coordinator Craig Hatcher has gone into school administration and Joe Harbley has become the head baseball coach at Dutch Fork. Kevin Dresser is the new linebacker coach at Central and former Eagle all-state player Trent Usher returns as a volunteer coach and he will work with defensive backs.

Coach Mangum calls defensive line coach Jim Baxley among “the best in the state” and is also glad to have Coach Baxley coaching outside linebackers. Red Mangum returns to coach the wide receivers and Coach Thurman will once again coach the running backs out of the high powered wishbone look.

The jayvee football team will once against be head coached by Coach Laird while Marty Smith, Jackie Mangum, and Scotty Miller will work with the B team.   

  The Eagle football team will return nine starters on offense and seven returnees on defense so the eagles should once against challenge in AA. “Two years ago we had a great team and everyone predicted that we would play for a state title and we did and then last year everyone thought we might have a slight rebuilding year and we played for the state title again so we are proud of what we have accomplished the past two seasons,” said Coach Mangum. “This season we are somewhere in the middle of the past two years but we have a chance if we can stay healthy and not look ahead. We lost 11 seniors off of last year’s team and they will be hard to replace.”

Several of the Eagle football leaders are senior lineman Josh Covington (6-1, 297), junior center J.R. Mangum (6-1, 260), senior lineman Greg Black (6-0,245), senior athlete Rodney Kirkland (5-8, 194), senior running back Radford Robinson (5-11, 193) and senior athlete Casey Lockhart (5-11, 160).

 

 

e so we worked on it in practice last week and I told him it is something that needs to work if we are going to spread it out some to keep the defenses honest," said Coach Mangum. "We like to spilt Kegan Funderburk out by himself on one side and then put two receivers on the other side. Really, this opens up our running game also because you have to do something to keep teams from putting eight or nine players in the box to stop our wishbone. I was pretty pleased with how our passing game was effective against Andrew Jackson."

Coach Mangum describes Kegan Funderburk as a potential NFL tight end. "He's going to draw double coverage a lot and he is averaging nearly 20 yards a catch," said Coach Mangum. "He's got 16 sacks on the season and is also playing great at defensive end but I like him an awful lot as a tight end prospect as well. He has 25 catches for 475 yards and 9 touchdowns. We sent out a tape on him to the Shrine Bowl recently and you wouldn't believe some of the plays he has made on both sides of the ball."    

Super Sophomore center J.R. Mangum (6-1, 245) and talented junior left tackle Josh Covington (6-0,281) continue to be very good leaders up-front. "I tell J.R. all the time that he has be a no doubt about it starter in our line because when you are the coaches son you have to prove you belong and I feel that he has done that this season with his play," said Coach Mangum. "He loves the game and he plays with passion and I feel that the rest of the guys playing with him look to him for leadership even though he is just a sophomore." Other offensive linemen starters include left guard Greg Black (6-1, 235), Eric Dzul (6-0, 205) and Uriah Roach (5-11, 200) rotate at the other guard and Gladden plays at right tackle.   Funderburk, Kendall Johnson, Jiwan Funderburk, and Quenton Miller have all shared time at tight end.

    On defense against A-J, Kegan Funderburk led Eagle tacklers with nine stops and two sacks. Defensive end Darius Gladden and Covington had seven tackles each and corner Deaja Blakeney had five tackles and an interception that he ran back 101 yards for a touchdown.

The linebackers are Kotedric Clyburn who has played two very good games back-to-back with Uriah Roach and Tevus Ratliff alternating at the other linebacker slot.

The secondary is supported by freshman to watch Debias Tyson, Blakeney at one corner, Smith at safety, and Des Blakeney is at a corner.

One bright spot for the Eagles is that defensive lineman Dedrick Shine has been cleared to practice and could see action as early as the first playoff game next week. "With his return we will have the same players in there that we started the season off with," said Coach Mangum.