Southeast Guilford names area middle school coach as its new girls basketball coach

Southeast Guilford girls basketball has gone through three coaches plus an interim coach over the past two years, before introducing its next one on Thursday.

Falcons athletics director Shaun Abernathy said that glowing recommendations led him to hire former Graham River Mill Academy standout Daijah Faucette, not as a stop-gap hire but as one who can rebuild the program and be a stabilizing figure.

She coached the Hairston Middle School girls team the past two seasons, with a dramatic turnaround leading up to a one-point loss in the 2026 conference championship game to Northeast Guilford Middle.

She replaces Rachel Clark, who guided the Falcons to 15-11 overall and a tie for second in the TAAC Six 5A/6A Conference at 7-3 this past season. That team loses a few key seniors to graduation, including leading scorer Morgan Odom.

Abernathy said her previous employers at Hairston Middle spoke highly of Faucette. "Just integrity, discipline and very supportive in nature, so we feel like she is good for the girls program and we look forward to seeing how she progresses."

Faucette has never been a high school coach, but Abernathy said her second interview was what won them over.

"We put them through quite a lot just to make sure we could get it right," Abernathy said of the interview process, "and we brought her in for the second time, put her in front of the administration, and they saw what we saw the first time," Abernathy said, "The energy, the positive nature, just what we need after some bumpy times, coaching changes in the past couple of years."

Faucette called it a rigorous hiring process but said that the administration's diligence and not just making a quick decision gave her the impression that Southeast was the best fit for her.

She said she was "just super-excited and super-grateful for the opportunity."

Faucette was a key guard on River Mill squads that went a combined 120-15, never lost a conference game and made deep playoff runs all four years from 2009-2013. In 2013, she scored 27 points as the Jaguars defeated Riverside in the regional semifinals, then played a big role on defense in the 55-38 win over previously unbeaten Lejeune in the regional finals, on the way to the program making its only ever state finals appearance.

She calls her coach at River Mill, Hamilton Perkins, "one of my biggest influences in basketball."

"This man was really hard on me...," Faucette said, "but I would have to say that he just really instilled that discipline and how far you can go as a team when you really work together and have that discipline instilled in your team."

After high school, Faucette got her start as a manager at Western Carolina from 2013-2016, which included being a videographer and breaking down film for the coaching staff. She learned much about the game working under then-Catamounts head coach Karen Middleton, who is currently an assistant at Duke.

She said learning patience was the biggest lesson she took from coaching middle school.

"You have to be willing to teach; you have to be willing to give time for them to learn," Faucette said. "It is not an overnight thing. You always want to hold them accountable, but you have to give them room to really learn and grow."

The new coach said Southeast fans should expect a lot of excitement, a very tough and disciplined team and a rough-and-tough defense.

"I'm super excited for the season to see what the girls are going to do," she said. "You'll just have to come to the games and find out."

The Southeast program went 17-11 in 2023-24 under coach Hannah Revis, who for that season was named Metro 4A Conference, NC Basketball Coaches Association District 7 and News & Record Area Coach of the Year. The team then went 14-11 in 2024-25 and hired former Page star Jasmine Gill in late April of 2025, although Gill left for a job with IMG Academy shortly before the ensuing season and never actually coached a game for Southeast.

Clark, who led Southeast to state titles in 2019 and 2020 during a previous stint, was hired just before the 2025-26 season started, making her the third coach for the program within a brief period.

"I'm going to be completely honest with you: I can't really worry about who was here before me," Faucette said.

"I really expect and am going to honestly make sure that Southeast has a successful basketball program, whether that means winning state championships or just having a place that kids come and really just want to be involved in the game and grow and get better."

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This story was originally published June 12, 2026 at 9:34 AM.