Lamar – Stephen Burris is only 37 years old, but he has been coaching high school football for 16 years. He has been a finalist for four other head coaching jobs during that time, but the fifth time was the charm.
Burris was named the head coach at Lamar High School, and he believes he is walking into a tremendous situation taking over a perennial Class A power.
“Now that it has finally happened, this is the fulfillment of a goal that I had when I first started out,” said Burris, who comes to Lamar after serving as the offensive coordinator at AAAA Ridge View the last two years. “I wasn't in a rush. I was wanting to go to a situation where I could be successful, different things I looked for. Lamar checks every box. It’s not a bad landing spot at all, all things considered.”
Burris inherits a team that went 9-4 a year ago and reached the third round of the state playoffs. He replaces Josh Pierce, who left Lamar after just one season to become the head coach at Conway High School. Pierce had replaced Chad Wilkes, who left Lamar to become the head coach at Oceanside Collegiate, which he led to the AA state championship game this past season after leading Lamar to the Class A upper state title game in 2021.
Lamar has been a powerhouse for the past three decades, winning five state championships since 2002. It has only had two seasons since 1995 in which it didn’t win at least eight games, one of those years being the COVID-19 season.
“Usually when you’re a new coach coming in, you’re in a rebuilding situation and you talk about building culture,” Burris said. “Lamar is a culture. When you tell the kids we're going to go right, all the kids go right. That's a blessing in itself. I can't thank the people who’ve come before me enough. That's a gift in itself.”
During Burris’ two seasons at Ridge View, the Blazers averaged 350 yards of total offense in his first season and 387 this past year.
Burris has been conducting spring practice with the Lamar players. He said he is flexible in building his offense around the tools that are available to him.
“Our strength right now is in our running game,” said Burris, who was a finalist for the head job at Conway, North Myrtle Beach, Airport and Aiken over the years. “We’ve got a young guy at the quarterback spot in sophomore Zori Pierce. He’s very smart, it’s just going to take a little tie to get him there.
“We’re returning three guys up, four if you count the tight end in Kendall Walton, Keaton Braddock, Dillon Van Horn and T.J. Johnson. We’re leading on the guys up front to establish the tone.”
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