Lake Wales Trims List of Basketball Coach Applicants to Nine

Fri. June 01, 2012 at 10:03 p.m. | By Solange Reyner

The job to become the head basketball coach at Lake Wales attracted 77 applications, but the school has narrowed its list to nine.

Billy Washington, who led the team to a Class 5A state title last year, resigned in late April after an incident at the school where a 17-year-old girl was injured by another student in the gymnasium where he was working.

The list of applicants are: Matt Anderson; Tyrhon Crawford, the head coach at Lake Region; Don Grant, a former coach at Winter Haven and coach of the year in 2008; Burney Hayes, the long-time assistant basketball coach at Lake Wales; Jimmie Johnson, a former coach at Bartow and Lake Wales; Keeth Jones, a former Lake Wales basketball coach who won state title in 2000 with the Highlanders; John Langlois; Randy Lee, a former player at Lake Wales in the 1990s and Don Wedewer, the head coach at Space Coast in Cocoa.