By Michael A. Lough

The Sports Report

centralgasports@gmail.com

The human resources department at Thomaston-Upson Schools and at Upson-Lee is about to get really busy.

In a very short span, Upson-Lee has lost its head football coach, head basketball coach, and athletics director.

Legendary basketball coach Darrell Lockhart is retiring, football coach Justin Elder is moving to a teaching job in Monroe County to be closer to family, and AD Chris Kirksey is taking a football-only job in Alabama.

The moves were first reported by the Upson Beacon on Wednesday.

Lockhart’s final season ended with great disappointment.

The Knights were in the GHSA Class AAA playoffs, and then they weren’t. The team failed to report the results of two games to MaxPreps, which is part of the equation the GHSA uses for postseason rankings in Class AAA, AA, and A/Division I. It wasn’t determined until after the seedings were done that Upson-Lee, as well as Westside-Augusta and Hephzibah, were incomplete in reporting scores, and that changed the seedings.

The two other schools’ seedings changed, but it bumped Upson-Lee from the postseason.

From The Upson Beacon
U-L basketball legend Lockhart retires
Elder ateps down from U-L football coaching
Kirksey resigns as U-L athletics director

Thus, Lockhart went 13-13 in his final season, minus a playoff berth.

“It’s time for me to step down,” Lockhart told the Beacon. “I’m just wore out. Tired. You need breaks here and there and need to have to do so much during the season. I’m tired. I love the game and I still love teaching the game, but I need a break. I need to step down and just sit back and chill for a while.”

The last season may have been disappointing, but Lockhart leaves having given Upson County memories for a lifetime.

In the middle of a 111-6 four-year run was a pair of undefeated seasons and consecutive state championships as well as a 75-game winning streak, one of the best stretches in state history. It was keyed by guards Tye Fagan and Zyrice Scott, with future NFL No. 1 pick Travon Walker in the middle.

For awhile, one couldn’t arrive too early at The Castle for the boys games.

“People came to see these kids play, and the kids played for them,” he told The Beacon. “There was a certain pride they had to do everything together, to do it right, and to do it convincingly. It’s great coaching a bunch of kids like that. All of them were coachable as well. I haven’t seen a team yet that could beat that group… It was so special.”

Lockhart was ready for a change and moved to Valdosta in 2019, rolled past 300 wins while winning a pair of region titles. After three seasons and 61 wins, he was back in Thomaston, going 71-38 in four seasons.

The 2005 inductee into the Thomaston-Upson Sports Hall of Fame now has to figure out what’s next.

“I don’t know what tomorrow is going to bring,” he told the paper. “I don’t know what it’s going to be like not having anything to do,” he said. “I’m not trying to think about that right now, but eventually it’s going to happen anyway.”

Elder is also leaving the sidelines, at least for the short term, as a teacher at Monroe County Middle School. He, too, leaves behind something of a legacy as Upson-Lee’s second-winningest coach in number with 51, three behind Mike Major.

He was hired by Eddie Payne, who lasted two seasons, 2006-07. Then he coached under Tommy Watson (six seasons, 23-38) and Tommy Parks.

His head coaching career developed under unusual and difficult circumstances. Parks led Upson-Lee to three straight winning seasons, which hadn’t happened in a decade. In the summer of 2017, he suffered cardiac arrest near his home, the result of a 100-percent blockage in an anterior artery.

He suffered a major loss of oxygen to his brain and went into full-time care. Elder spent that season as interim head coach, and was promoted to the permanent position after going 4-6, with four losses coming by a total of 22 points.

Elder leaves as Upson-Lee’s longest-serving head coach with nine seasons. Upson-Lee has had nine head coaches since the merger in 1992 of R.E. Lee Institute and Upson County.

Elder’s is a family decision. His wife is an assistant superintendent of Monroe County Schools, and they have three children: Daughter Charliegh (22) works in Forsyth and Olivia (18) is at Georgia Southern. Sam (12) goes to school in Monroe County, and they live in Culloden.

Elder intends to beef up his help with the family logistics, now working in the same town as his wife and where Sam goes to school. Elder decided he’d rather keep Sam where his friends were rather than travel to Thomaston.

“That made my decision real easy,” Elder, who currently has no coaching position in place next year, told The Central Georgia Sports Report. “He’s got a really good group of kids that he’s been tight with since they’ve been in pre-K.

“It was at the point where he’s going to be playing middle school ball next year, and if he’s playing and I’m coaching … I don’t ever get to watch him play.”

But he’ll be keepingan eye on what’s happening to the west.

“The only two places I ever wanted to coach was (Mary Persons) and where I’m at now,” the 48-year-old said. “(Upson-Lee) will always be important to me.”

Kirksey also got an itch that he’ll be able to scratch again after two years as athletics director.

The former Taylor County head coach (51-63-1 from 2004-2014) has been on Elder’s staff for four years – with an emphasis on weight training - and the school’s athletics director for one.

He’s a veteran of the former job and was a rookie at the latter.

“It was a learning experience,” he said. “It was something I had never done. It was good and gave me an opportunity to meet not only just the football players, but baseball, soccer, try to go to every group and encourage the importance of working and getting in weight training. That’s been the fun part of being involved in the AD job.”

But he knows where his strength is.

“You know what you’re best at, and what your gift is,” he told the Beacon. “My gift isn’t looking at a computer screen and making sure we have one of 25 forms in. I told (principal) Ricky English that I’m a ‘trench digger.’ I want to get my hands dirty.

“My love is coaching. … I still love these kids. I’ve been their strength coach for four years. They do everything I tell them to do, and they bust their tail for me, so why would I want anything but the best for them?”