Prep notebook: Millbrook rids gymnasium of green-glowing lights

The greenish glow that tinted every photo and video taken in Millbrook’s gymnasium over the past decade has met its demise. Athletic director and boys’ basketball coach Scott McInnes said the county replaced the gymnasium’s dim lights, which had long ago been worn out.

“I don’t know what it was called, but it does not emit bright white light,” McInnes said. “It was terrible. Our senior pictures would come out green.”

“I had (sports) photographers tell us ‘I love you but I’m never coming back.’”

New ECH coach: Ryan Johnson is likely to be the next head football coach at East Chapel Hill. If confirmed as expected by the district's school board at its Thursday business meeting, Johnson would be the fourth football head coach at East Chapel Hill in four years.

Johnson was defensive coordinator last year for the 0-11 Wildcats, who forfeited three of their last four games because of a lack of healthy players. He's been leading summer workouts for the returning players, and he’s been serving as interim coach since 2014 head coach Mike Holderman told athletic director Ray Hartsfield on June 30 he was leaving.

“No one saw this coming,” Johnson said. “It was a tough situation last year, but I thought (Holderman) was going to see if things could be worked out.”

Johnson is a 2004 graduate of Elon, where he played on the defensive and later offensive line. He served as a football assistant at Graham, Eastern Guilford, Southwest Guilford, Southern Alamance and North Moore before arriving at East Chapel Hill. Last year, he was head coach of East's wrestling team.

Mike Holderman and Jon Sherman each coached at East Chapel Hill for one season after Bill Renner retired after the 2012 season.

Garner-Cleveland on TV: When Garner visits Cleveland in week two of the high school football season, it will be one of a handful of games from across the state to be broadcast live on Time Warner Cable on Aug. 27 at 7:30 p.m.

The N.C. High School Athletic Association and Time Warner reached a deal last year to move some high school football games to Thursday for live broadcasts. In the past, games were only shown on tape delay the next morning or on demand.

All-American soccer: Wakefield graduate Kat McDonald and Jordan rising freshman Brianna Pinto were named to the National Soccer Coaches Association of America’s All-American team. McDonald and Pinto split the state’s player of the year awards, with McDonald winning the N.C. Coaches Association’s top honor while Pinto won the N.C. Gatorade award.

West Johnston grad wins two golds: West Johnston grad and Garner resident Sarah Henry won two gold medals at the World University Games in Gqangju, South Korea, this past week. Henry repeated as a world champ in the 800-meter freestyle relay and grabbed her first individual WUG gold medal in the 400 individual medley.

Henry, a former NCAA champion at Texas A&M, took control of the 400 IM during her freestyle leg, bettering Barbora Zavadova of the Czech Republic’s split in the stroke by more than a second. She won the race, held on July 4, in 4:38.88. It was the USA’s first of many medals in the games.

Girls lax all-Americans: Cardinal Gibbons’ Jordan Lappin and Durham Academy’s Chloe Lewis were the only two Triangle girls lacrosse players named All-American by U.S. Lacrosse. Only six North Carolina players made the team.

The U.S. Lacrosse all-Academic team was a different story with 30 area players being named to the team including Lewis, who will play at Duke next year.

The others were Apex’s Mia Castagnero, Meredith Chapman, Elisabeth Lowe; Athens Drive’s Madeline Bromley and Kieran Garvey; Cardinal Gibbons’ Sarah Comstock, Sydney Anderson, Morgan Winstead and Maggie Woodworth; Durham Academy’s Jordan Barry, Elayne Wang, Annette Lombard, Elizabeth Hall; Millbrook’s Erin Brooks, Emily Fordice, Brenna Knight, Brooke Elsam, Alexis Ankrum; Broughton’s Sydney Fry, Olivia Joyner and Mary Neil Hodl; Ravenscroft’s Olivia Aschman, Cailin Dorsey, Sydnie Schawrz, Rachel Edwards and Natalie Hianik; Wakefield’s Ariel Gold, Megan Blawas and Sam Begin.

ECH’s Cox makes boys’ list: East Chapel Hill’s Chris Cox was left off Monday’s notebook as an area player who made the U.S. Lacrosse boys’ lacrosse All-American team.

This story was originally published July 9, 2015 at 12:28 PM with the headline "Prep notebook: Millbrook rids gymnasium of green-glowing lights."