Mount Holly HOF 2023 by SouthlakeChristianAcademy

2023 Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony

Event Program

Opening Remarks ........................................ Tyler Berg

Presentation of Colors ................................. Rankin Safety Patrol

Pledge of Allegiance ................................... Rankin Safety Patrol

Singing of our National Anthem ................ Ashley Flowers

Invocation

Dinner

Welcome ..................................................... Mayor Bryan Hough

Recognition of Special Guests .................... James Ford

Past Inductees

Corporate Sponsors

City and County Officials

Committee Members

Special Thanks

2023 Scholarships & AOY

Presentation by............................................. James Ford

Induction Ceremony

Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame Community Spirit Award

Sponsored by American & Efird ..................... Scott Pope

Presented to Rodney Abernathy

Mount Holly Girsl Basketball 1959-60........ Eddie Wilson

John Jessen .................................................. Gary Neely

Shelton Camp ............................................. Doug Smith

East Gaston High Warriors 01-02 ............... Tyler Berg

Tameron Sealey Rushing ............................. Scott Pope

Cameron Sealey Flachofsty ......................... Scott Pope

Closing Remarks ......................................... Tyler Berg

MHHS Song ............................................... Eddie Wilson

EGHS Song ................................................. Ashley Flowers

Hall of Fame Committee

President - Tyler Berg

Vice President - Richard Browne

Treasurer - Doug Smith

Secretary - Eddie Wilson

Committee Members - James Ford, Gary Neely and Scott Pope

2007

Coach Delmer Wiles

Robert Black

2008

Arthur Davis

Bearl Davis

Max Davis

Wilbern Davis

Bertha Dunn

George Fincher

Neb Hollis

2009

Coach Dick Thompson

Vivian Laye Broome

Tommy Wilson

Don Killian

Ray Campbell

1963 MHHS Football Team

2010

Joe Huffstetler

John Farrar

Coach Joe Spears

Johnny Wike

1990 East Gaston Wrestling Team

Community Spirit Award Winner

Dwight Frady

2011

Bruce Bolick

Wayne Bolick

Frank Love

Perry Toomey

Scott Stewart

T.L. McManus

Jim McManus

Samuel “Dink” McManus

Community Spirit Award Winner

John Lewis

2012

Larry Hartsell

Freddy Whitt

Dawn Moose

Past Inductees

Ronnie Harrison, Sr.

William Outen

1967 MHHS Football Team

Community Spirit Award Winner

Bobby John Rhyne

2013

J.B. Thompson

Charlie “Poss” Drumm

Doug Smith

Shane Trull

1940’s MHHS Hawkettes Basketball

1960’s MHHS Hawkettes Basketball

Community Spirit Award Winner

Sarah Nixon

2014

Lois Herring Parker

A.C. Hollar

Larry Lawing

Eddie Wilson

Tracy Black

Richard Dill

Community Spirit Award Winner

Buddie Hodges

2015

Zeb McDowell

Max Sherrill

Phil Roberts

Laura Randall Woodhead

1954-55 Hawks Baseball

1967-68 & 1968-69

Hawks Basketball

Community Spirit Award Winner

Barry Jessen

2016

Barry Grice

Derek Spears

Stephanie Frazier

Jerry Brooks

1991 East Gaston Wrestling

Community Spirit Award Winner

Aaron Goforth

2017

Eddie Wyatt, Jr.

Grant Hoffman Jr.

Carmen Baker

James Ford

East Gaston’s 1977 Golf Team

Community Spirit Award Winner

Carl Baber

2018

Tony Leroy McConnell

William Phillip White

Sue Carlton Whitley

John Logan

Jeff Lee

Hawks Baseball 1964-1967

Community Spirit Award Winner

Henry Massey

2019

1941 Hawks

Howard Horton

Sam Brown

April Harte

Tyler Berg

1978 East Gaston Football Team

Community Spirit Award Winner

Scott Pope

2020

No Inductees due to COVID-19

2021

Reggie Ballard

Donald Fortner

Mike Featherstone

Brooke Wilkinson

Scottie Holden

1992 East Gaston Wrestling

Community Spirit Award Winner

Eddie Womack

2022

Steve Hansel

Robert Nichols, Jr.

Marrio McCorkle

Stewart Hare

1956 Mount Holly Hawks Football

Community Spirit Award Winner

Harry Adams

2023 MHSHOF Scholarships

2023 MHSHOF Scholarship

Winners & Sponsors

Heather Longnecker, Appalachian State University.

Pat Hartsell Scholarship

2023 MHSHOF Scholarships

Individual Endowment Opportunities Are Available

Guidelines for Applications

The MHSHOF scholarship is awarded on the basis of a competitive process that considers academic achievement, extracurricular and community involvement and financial need. Four seven hundred and fifty dollar scholarships are paid directly to the recipient’s school, where the student must be enrolled and in good standing.

To be considered for this scholarship, applicants must meet the following criteria:

• A high school senior.

• Maintain a GPA of at least 3.0 on a 4.0 scale.

• Applied to a credited college or university.

• Must not be a dependent of a member of the board of the MHSHOF or of the guidance department.

• Must not be a recipient of a major scholarship of $3000 or more from another source.

Purpose and Process

The purpose of the MHSHOF Scholarship is to provide college funds to deserving students with financial need. The scholarship is paid directly to the recipient’s school for tuition. The recipient supplies the information needed to submit the payment.

Application Process

Applications must be submitted on or by April 1 to the Guidance Department at East Gaston High School and Stuart Cramer High School.

* Individual Endorsement Opportunities are Available

Hall of Fame Committee

Mission Statement of the Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame:

e Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame was established to honor our community’s rich sports history and to recognize the outstanding individuals and teams who have excelled over the last century on behalf of our city.

Our ultimate goal is to educate the community about the outstanding accomplishments of these individuals and teams, instill civic pride in our citizens and promote Mount Holly. Our emphasis on education has led us to develop a scholarship program through our local high schools.

In addition to education, the Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame supports charitable contributions for youth groups and local civic organizations by committing to pay out 10% of its year end balance of funds to non-pro ts. e MHSHOF has worked out a process of displaying inductee sports memorabilia at the Mount Holly Historical Society for the bene t of the community.

The Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame Salutes the following Athletes of the Year.

Stuart Cramer Highschool

Justin Rocquemore • Alexis Willis

Athletic Director: Brad Sloan

Mount Holly Middle School xxxxxx • xxxxxx

Athletic Director: Courtney Wellman

East Gaston High School

Braylon Clark • Mallory Hall

Athletic Director: Haley Stewart

Committee Members — Photograph by John Robinson

School Songs

2023 Community Spirit Award

Rodney AbeRnAthy

That’s the Spirit

Rodney Abernathy dedicated his career toMount Holly youth sports and the fields where they played

Rodney Abernathy’s nephew wanted to play football, so Abernathy gave the young boy rides to Mighty Mites practice. Abernathy knew the game, having played youth and high school ball, so he was asked to help coach. The following season, someone asked one day at Junior Midgets practice if he could fill in until the coach arrived.

“Well, the coach never showed up, so I became the coach,” Abernathy says. “To this day, I don’t know if there was a coach or if they were tricking me into being the coach. It may have been a trap to get me over there. But I loved it. Football is one of my favorite sports.”

Right place, right time.

“I thought I could go back and help the kids out and see them get to the next level,” he says. “It’s something I enjoy doing.”

Abernathy’s 20-plus years of commitment to helping

“To see the kids advance, it’s just a dream come true. And to have the kids come back years later and thank me for helping them…,” he says. “You’re not going to make a lot of money at it, but you do it because you enjoy helping the kids.”

youth succeed in sports – as a coach, a mentor or someone who just makes sure the field is in shape – has earned him the 2023 Community Spirit Award in the Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame.

When he learned of the award, he thought he was being tricked. Again.

“When I started playing football, my coach was Scotty Pope, and his son ended up playing for me at the Junior Midget level. And Coach Pope coached me at Junior Midgets. So he coached me and I coached his son, Justin,” Abernathy says. “That’s pretty cool.

“So Coach Pope calls me recently on a Saturday and said he was checking to see how I was doing, because I had some cancer going on, and he called to check, and I told him everything’s healing up real good. And he said, ‘I got one more thing I got to tell you. Your name has come up, and we voted you into the Sports Hall of Fame. We think highly of you.’ That was the one phone call I was not expecting to get.”

The date was April 1.

When they hung up, Abernathy told his wife, Themesa,

“Wait, did he just April Fools me?”

They waited for Pope to call back. He didn’t.

“So I’m guessing it was for real.”

Abernathy’s devotion to Mount Holly-area sports began shortly after his 1984 graduation from East Gaston High School, where he played football and baseball and ran track. In the early ‘90s, he says, the high school track coach contacted him about coaching Pop Warner ball. He coached Junior Midgets for 15 years.

He also was an assistant track coach at East Gaston for several years before going to Mount Holly Middle School as an assistant football coach, then back to East Gaston as a football assistant, all while coaching Pop Warner.

“We won a bunch of championships, and we won the Holly Bowl in McAdenville and a lot of different bowl games in Pop Warner,” he says. “They’re age 11 to 13 but I call them my olderlighter athletes. Like, they’re maybe 112 pounds or something, not the really big kids who play in the middle schools.”

But, again: Right place, right time.

And being present for young athletes.

“To see the kids advance, it’s just a dream come true. And to have the kids come back years later and thank me for helping them…,” he says. “You’re not going to make a lot of money at it, but you do it because you enjoy helping the kids.”

When the field behind Rankin Elementary needed updates in what was termed the Field of Dreams project, Abernathy immediately volunteered.

“A lot of people in the community were involved with it. I just asked what they needed help with,” he says. “I just did whatever was needed. We had to line the field, paint the field, we rebuilt the concessions stand, put up new lights on the football field, re-did the locker rooms and the press box, got new goal posts. It was a total remodel of the field.”

Right place, and the importance of showing up.

Away from sports, Abernathy works for Clarion in Mount Holly as a company firefighter. He will have been there 35 years in August and is a manager. He also sings in a local Gospel group, the Mount Holly QCs and has been a drummer since age 9.

He has four sons, ages 22 to 37, and has passed along his philosophy of helping others.

“Me and my wife, we’re home by ourselves now. They’ve moved out. The one thing I tried to tell my boys is, you can have whatever you want but you have to work for it,” he says, “and if you do that, it’ll work out great. Now, they are managers, supervisors, they go to work every day and are taking care of what they need.”

It has its rewards.

“I told Coach Pope this [the Hall of Fame] is something

I never thought would happen to me. I did all the coaching and helping out because I wanted to make them better, and I’m like a father to some of them,” he says. “I told them, ‘You can call me day or night. Even when I’m not your coach, you can call me.’ And even today, they call on me. And parents, who say ‘I’m glad my son played for you.’ It means a lot. It really does. I did it for them. It’s all about what I can give back, and that’s what I’m here for.” ■

— By Kathy Blake

Career Highlights

Rodney Abernathy

• Coaching: More than 20 years with Pop Warner football, Mount Holly Middle School football and East Gaston High School football and track.

• Community: Helped with Mount Holly facilities and community sports projects, including Field of Dreams and Optimist Club.

Mount holly GiRsl bAsketbAll 1959-60

Play Like a Girl?

Mount Holly’s 1960 team was tough, determined and won a championship

Girls basketball teams played half-court ball.

Players wore knee pads, for protection if they fell.

Some younger ones would be benched after only a few minutes’ court time, so they could ‘rest.’

It was a different ballgame in 1959-60. Different rules. But that didn’t stop Mount Holly High School’s athletes from being daring, aggressive, high-scoring winners.

“You talk about scrappy girls, they would go after that ball like it was a diamond ring,” says Linda Holbrook Cloninger, a freshman forward. “I wish we had some film of it. It was unbelievable.”

How scrappy were they?

“I got hit in the face with a basketball one day and it broke the cartilage in my nose,” Cloninger says. “I wanted to go have it

fixed, but the doctor said, ‘Don’t worry about it. You can breathe.’”

Mount Holly’s girls went 11-2 that year, beat Stanley 61-46 in the teams’ final meeting to be co-conference champs and beat Tryon 49-46 to be Little Tournament champions. Their trailblazing efforts have led to their being inducted into the Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame.

“We are very honored to be chosen, because years ago women didn’t really get recognized that much. It was always the men,” Cloninger says. “And we feel very privileged that they realize we worked so hard. We were there every day, diligently, practicing and running and we would stand and shoot 100 foul shots and have scrimmages. We were hard-core.”

Off the court, in the classrooms, girls had Future Homemakers of America and were required to take Home Economics. They sewed dresses and had to show their work during an assembly. After school, while boys played football and basketball and a handful of other sports, girls played – well, basketball.

But this crew got the memo early. Times would change.

“We were restricted to jobs of being nurses, secretaries or

school teachers. You know how people were,” says freshman forward Mary Reel Hartness. “Know what I was? I was a police officer. For the city of Gastonia. And I went to college.”

Cloninger became a sales rep. “I was successful and worked hard at it,” she says. Her initial choice was to become a flight attendant – known as stewardesses, then – but that required out-of-state training and meeting a height requirement of 5-foot-7, “You know, so you could put people’s things in the overhead for them.” Cloninger was 5-8, but she wasn’t playing that game.

Hartness, who was 6-foot-3, says she would like to have tried pro ball, “But I was in that age group [in the 1960s] when women couldn’t do anything like that, really. I was the forwardthinker of my time.”

The 1959-1960 team in addition to Cloninger and Hartness was Miriam Smith, Vicki White, Diane Lyman, Phyllis Fritts, Barbara Biddix, Shirley Grice, Sue Mason, Jo Ricka Greene, cocaptain Abbie Moore, co-captain Ann Oglesby, Doris Miller, Linda Robinson, Delores Puett, Linda Wharton, Sue Sisk, Maxine Shiver, Judy Morris, Juanita Helms, Mickey Thompson, manager Gloria Helms and coach Bill Megginson.

Some of their biggest victories were 52-38 over Lowell, 46-35 over Cramerton and 49-36 over Dallas.

“I played a good bit, because I started practicing with them in eighth grade,” Hartness says. “We had decent crowds and we did have quite a few come to our games, because they would come to ours then watch the boys play. We had some good players. I remember Ann Oglesby was a good player, and Doris Miller because we competed against each other all the time because she was tall like me and I was aggressive.

“We had to stay on one side of the court, and I remember having to run to the other end to get rebounds, and running back to the other end to score. Their guards played one side, and our guards played the other side and they had to get the ball and throw it over,” Hartness says. “Most of my playing was up close, and it was easy to dominate.”

Cloninger says she became interested in the sport in sixth grade. “We would play outside during recess, and I was one of four freshmen who got put on the varsity team,” she says. “I didn’t even have a basketball goal at my house to practice on. Everything I learned, I learned at school.

“I remember Doris Miller scored 34 points one time against Stanley, and Judy Morris was a real good player who usually scored in the high teens, and Jo Ricka Greene was a very good ballplayer who had 27 points one game.

“It was a big deal if you played basketball. Everybody [at school] sort of looked at the players like, you were really something if you played.”

Megginson left and was replaced the following year by Coach Joe Spears. The women are quick to credit Spears with molding them as players and goal-setters. “He was good to us girls,” Hartness says. “I went to the [Hall of Fame] ceremony the time he got inducted [in 2010].”

“I don’t think I could have played basketball if not for Joe Spears,” Cloninger says. “I had to walk home 2-and-a-half miles after practice, and he would take me home. If some of us girls didn’t have a way home, he would take us himself. He was like a second father to us. He worked with us so much, and that’s the reason we thought so highly of him. If he saw potential in you, he would work with you and bring that out.”

And now, 63 years later, the team is in the Hall as well. The players are in their late 70s, early 80s.

“They waited a long time, but we’re in there,” Cloninger says. “We were probably one of the best girls basketball teams Mount Holly ever had, because everybody was very athletic and they were encouraged to do well for the school and make the school look good. It was just a great group of girls, and everyone got along so well. It was special.” ■

— By Kathy Blake

Career Highlights

Mount Holly Girls Basketball 1959-1960

• Overall record: 11-2

• Co-Conference champions

• Little Tournament champions

John Jessen

Destined to Serve

John Jessen turned success as a tennis player into a way to encourage youth through sport

John Jessen still owns two vintage, wooden Jack Kramer tennis rackets. His first racket was a Slazenger that belonged to his dad. “I don’t know where that old wooden racket is now, and they don’t make them like that anymore,” he says. “But it was the first one I played with, and it was old to start with.”

Jessen has been involved with tennis since he was a high school junior in 1961. He learned the game from Frank Love, who started the program at Mount Holly High School, and longtime friend Barry Grice, who developed the first competitive team at Charlotte College when it became UNC-Charlotte.

Both Love and Grice are in the Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame.

Now Jessen, who turns 80 in October, is too.

“It’s an honor to be put in there. A lot of the inductees, I don’t know because some were before my time and some after me, but it’s nice to be recognized with them,” he says. “The ones I knew like brothers were Frank Love and Barry Grice, and it’s nice to be in there with them.”

Jessen played for Lees-McRae Junior College, then with an Air Force team and at UNCC. After college, he combined his work schedule with playing on a Mount Holly team that included Love and Grice and competed in the N.C. Piedmont Tennis League. “This is where my tennis game got much better,” he says.

A friend who was the pro at Gaston Country Club approached Jessen about becoming Director of Tennis and head pro in charge of all tennis activities.

“After talking it over with my wife, I took the job,” he says. He was there 15 years in the 1970s and ’80s.

And that is where Jessen was able to introduce his love for the game to children of Gaston County.

“My main objective in the tennis business was to get a kid good enough to play [competitively], because then most of them went to Gaston Day School and most would probably go to college,” he says, “so I wanted someone to like the game enough that if they heard ‘Let’s go play some tennis,’ they’d grab their racket and go. Then I would have accomplished what I wanted to do.

“You always look for that diamond in the rough. I just worked with the youth; that’s what I wanted to do. When we started the Junior Tennis League, there were a number of racket clubs in the area and that’s who we played against.”

After forming the junior league, Jessen received a Merit Award from the N.C. Tennis Association.

“During my time at the country club, I had the honor of having a number of young men work for me that I hope I had an influence on, not only with their tennis but their success in life,” Jessen says. “Some of their accomplishments were [becoming] a CPA, college professor, director of athletics, top sales rep and a successful tennis director and pro. I like to think I had something to do with it.”

Tennis has been in Jessen’s life for nearly seven decades, but it isn’t his only sport.

He learned basketball on neighborhood playgrounds with his brother Barry and others and competed with a Jaycees team. He made the varsity team as a Mount Holly High School freshman, the first underclassman to do so. He started every game as a sophomore (second-team All-Conference), junior (All-Conference and All-Tournament) and senior (first team All-Conference and All-Tournament).

His junior year, MHHS’ coach was Don Killian. It was Coach Killian’s first year.

Jessen was averaging double figures.

Coach Killian held the record for most points scored in a game.

One night Jessen was “in the zone,” he says. One of those games when you just can’t miss. He had 20-plus points in the first half.

“I asked the coach at halftime if he would let me break his record if I had the chance,” Jessen says. “I was told not while he was coaching. I had 35 points by

the third quarter, and I was taken out and didn’t play the fourth. I never will forget that.”

Jessen walked-on with Lees-McRae Junior College for basketball and accidentally ran cross-country, helping the team to the conference championship.

“The basketball coach called a team meeting, and we all thought we were going to start practice early. Turns out, the school needed a cross-country team and the coach volunteered the basketball team,” he says.

He walked-on with the tennis team and made the top four in singles and was number three in doubles. “I pretty much had to learn the game on my own. The thing about being a self-taught player, I only knew how to do one thing: Run everything down and get it back in play,” he says. “I was a marathon player. I outlasted my opponents with scores like 8-6, 10-12, 13-11.”

His two years in Banner Elk ended with a role in the Air Force.

“It was the height of Vietnam. I was a radar operator, looking for unidentified aircraft. When I joined, I thought I might do a little traveling. I was stationed in Winston-Salem for four years.”

He played base team basketball and fast-pitch softball and worked a radar station known as a ‘gap-filler,’ which covered the range between stations in the Outer Banks and Charleston.

He married his late wife Pat, and with her encouragement Jessen returned to school at UNC-Charlotte after the Air Force and was part of the school’s return to competitive tennis. He

played the No. 1 spot and lettered his two years there.

“My biggest accomplishment was winning the conference championship at Lees-McRae and later being ranked No. 9 in the state in singles and No. 5 in doubles when I played in the 35s age group. Being ranked in that top 10 and top five was something I worked really hard to do,” he says. “Most athletes aspire to be as good as they can, and that’s what I tried to do with basketball and tennis. I tried to be the best I could be.”

Jessen has two sons: One lives in Arizona, one in North Carolina. He and his wife, Joan, were married in 2012 and they live in Hendersonville now. He’s had some issues with his hip and knees, but he’s discovered a way to keep swinging a racket.

“I teach and coach Pickleball. It’s a great sport. I call it minitennis,” he says. “The court is half the size, but you still have to have a ground stroke; you still have to have a volley. Most sports are easy to learn but hard to master. Pickleball is like that.

“Being in the Mount Holly Hall of Fame, I take it as a nice honor and recognition of accomplishments in that I think most athletes aspire to be as good as they can be, and I take this as recognition from my peers saying ‘Well done; you did a good job.’ I did what I set out to do, to be the best I could be.” ■

— By Kathy Blake

Career Highlights

John Jessen

• Mount Holly High School 1959-1963: Basketball – All-Conference and AllTournament, junior and years; Tennis; Football (senior).

• Lees-McRae Junior College 1963-1965: Basketball; Cross-Country (N.C. Jr. College Athletic Conference champions); Tennis (top 4 in singles, No. 3 position in doubles; conference champs freshman year.) Lettered in all three sports.

• UNCC 1969-1971: Tennis (No. 1 spot both years).

• Gaston Country Club: Director of Tennis, head tennis pro for 15 years.

• Local and state tournaments: No. 9 in N.C. in singles; No. 5 in N.C. in doubles.

• Also: Coach/ tennis instructor at East Gaston High School; coached rec league basketball; Belmont Abbey tennis assistant two years.

shelton CAMp

No Time to Lose

Shelton Camp took up wrestling in middle school. He graduated high school as state champion.

Shelton Camp didn’t grow up with “high school wrestler” on his to-do list.

But as he was leaving W.C. Friday Middle School in Dallas one afternoon, he heard a voice:

“I’ll see you tomorrow at practice.” Practice? For what?

“Football season was over, and I guess this guy told the coach I’d do it. This was in seventh grade. I liked it, but I wasn’t good the first year,” Camp says. “I got beat all the time.”

Camp decided he was capable of more.

He became driven, focused.

“Me and my friend started training, and since I got beat up the first year, I was determined that the next year I was going

“My senior year was amazing. There were a couple of big matches, but one of them was when I won the West Regional and was MVP of the tournament,” he says. “The guy I wrestled in the finals was undefeated, and of course I was undefeated, and it was a two-day tournament so there was a lot of talk – a lot of talk –going on, and that was one of the biggest matches I had.”

to make a better effort,” he says. “I won Most Improved. Pretty much after that it was just like, I knew what I wanted to do in high school. I wanted to win the state championship.”

What happened during three years at East Gaston High School became Camp’s second ticket to the Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame.

The 1990-91 East Gaston High School team, coached by Doug Smith, was inducted in 2021 in honor of its 20-0 season and second of three consecutive state championships. That year, the Warriors were 6-0 in the Tri-County 4A Conference and beat Cary for the state title.

This year, Camp, 47, is entering as an individual.

“It kind of caught me off guard when I got the call,” he says, “but it was good. I’d hoped I would be able to do it.”

Camp compiled a 96-6-1 record in three years at East Gaston. He went 35-0 his senior year and won that state championship in the 160-pound division.

He went 21-5 as a 153-pound sophomore in 1990-91, then 35-1-1 in 1991-92 under head coach Bryan Lingerfelt, who led the team to a 14-1 record and 30-25 victory over Orange High School in the state championship.

Then came the finale, 1992-93.

“My senior year was amazing. There were a couple of big matches, but one of them was when I won the West Regional and was MVP of the tournament,” he says. “The guy I wrestled in the finals was undefeated, and of course I was undefeated, and it was a two-day tournament so there was a lot of talk – a lot of talk –going on, and that was one of the biggest matches I had.”

Camp recalls being “pretty much in control” the whole match. “I had him pinned in the second period, and I’m glad it went three periods,” he says. “I had a chance to finish it all the way through and win after two days of hype.”

Part of that hype is the Parade of Champions.

“When it comes down to the state finals, the top four in each weight class all marched in a circle in the stadium before the finals,” he says. “And they played that song [“We Are the Champions” by Queen] and it’s just cool because it’s all the different teams. Most of them, it was their last match of high school. They played that song and you can’t even describe the goosebumps.”

After high school, Camp attended junior college, played a little semi-pro football, then enrolled in Gaston College, where he studied welding. He’s progressed to being a QA (Quality Assurance), the person who uses technological methods to test or assure the quality of welds.

Camp still lives in Dallas. He has four children, a fiancé and the satisfaction of winning that high school championship.

“My mom motivated me,” he says. “She came to almost every one of my matches. She may have missed one my senior year. She was always cheering and hollering for me. I didn’t want to disappoint her.”

From “See you tomorrow at practice” to ‘We are the champions/No time for losers/’Cause we are the champions of the world.’ ■

— By Kathy Blake

Career Highlights

• East Gaston High School 1990-1993: Wrestling – sophomore, 21-5 record; junior 35-1-1, third in state; senior 37-0, state champion at 160 pounds.

Shelton Camp

eAst GAston hiGh WARRioRs 01-02

The Banner Year

The boys made a promise to each other, then gave East Gaston a championship

It’s 5 a.m.

On the dark backroads of Mount Holly near Sandy Ford down to Morningside and beyond, Coach Eugene Farrar edges his 1997 two-toned Mitsubishi Montero Sport quietly through sleepy, warm September air, convincing himself these meandering, pre-dawn drives are a blessing.

He slows to the curb at seven, eight, sometimes nine houses just long enough for a young athlete to race from the front door and pile in. “Three or four would climb into the backseat, then the whole back was open, so another four or five would climb in there. The guys who had to get in the back, I’d get them last so it wasn’t so long a ride,” Farrar says.

A few minutes before 6, the Montero is in the high school parking lot. One by one, lights click on inside the gymnasium, beginning the day.

It’s 2001.

Farrar is assistant coach of East Gaston High School boys basketball. He’s part-time on the school payroll, so he works a third-shift job, too.

Sleep is irrelevant. His boys were on a mission.

Team members voluntarily gathered for a group meeting at the beginning of the school year. While their minds were still clear, before homework and exams and high school expectations set in, they devised a plan, because they knew when November came, they’d be high on sweat and adrenaline, and that’s no time for pondering.

“So we set down at the beginning of the year and we were like, as a team let’s figure out what we wanted to do,” says Tyler Berg, a 6-9 senior center, “and we wanted to put a banner up in the gym. There wasn’t one up there for basketball. So that was the goal: Win the conference tournament and go to State. What do we have to do to get to that point? How can we get that banner up there?”

Players asked school personnel permission to play pick-up in the gym after school.

No dice.

“Some kind of crazy rule,” Berg says.

Farrar heard about the meeting.

“A lot of the basketball guys were playing football, and at the time with the 2002 team, I was working third shift so I couldn’t stay. But I knew we’d have to get in the gym if we were going to be able to compete,” Farrar says. “So I talked to [head coach] Ken Howell, and said we don’t have the advantage that Ashbrook has, or Huss has. When those guys finish playing football, they have a place to walk to after practice where they can play. We’d have to be in the school gym at 5 p.m., and I can’t go at 5.”

So, mornings?

“We asked, ‘What about 6 a.m.?’” Berg says.

Coach Howell got the go-ahead from school personnel.

“We would get up at 5 or 5:30 and meet at the gym at 6 a couple mornings a week,” Berg says. “That way the football players could play, too, and we could build team chemistry and know what each other’s tendencies were, and build that bond. We did that until the season started, then in practices we’d reiterate what our goal was and all get on the same page. We’d say, we have good players and good chemistry. Let’s put a banner on the wall.”

That 2001-2002 EGHS boys basketball team got its banner on the gym wall.

It also compiled the best record in school history: 22-5.

This year, it’s part of the Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame.

“I was worried they might be tired [after 6 a.m. workouts] and wouldn’t be able to function in their first and second classes,” Farrar says now. “But I got positive feedback from the teachers. They said, ‘It’s the most their scores have been up all semester. What are you doing?’ So that’s what those guys were able to do, to play together and play for each other.”

“He encouraged us to [practice early] and he was a major part of what happened with us,” says Aaron Forney, a 6-2 junior small forward, “and he would pick us up, because a lot of us didn’t have a license at the time. He did it for months, and we’d get to the gym and while others were sleeping, we were working. It was a unique situation. We had 13, 14 on the roster and in the early morning at least 11 of us would be there.”

“We had a really good team that year,” says Jason Sumpter, a 5-10 senior point guard and one of the players with a driver license. “Everyone wanted to do well and get better.”

The team didn’t lose a game until the Christmas tournament.

“We lost a close game, then after Christmas break when conference play started, we lost to Ashbrook twice,” Berg says. “They were our toughest competitors in the conference. Other than that, we were in control.”

“The conference tournament that year was a very big deal,” Forney says. “It was super competitive. We all knew each other from the different schools, and we’d see each other outside of school as well. Ashbrook was our nemesis.”

East Gaston was the second seed and hosted its first-round game of the Big South 3A conference tournament. Ashbrook, which finished the year 22-4, was top seed.

“We beat Burns, then played Forest View and beat them pretty handily,” Sumpter says.

“We made it to the finals of the tournament and had to play Ashbrook again,” Berg says. “And we said, no way we’re going to lose to them. The students were very vocal; it was a hostile environment.”

The game was on Ashbrook’s court. “Very hostile environment. Very loud,” Sumpter says. “We were the No. 1 and No. 2 teams all year and we finally beat them. I had the ball at the end and I just chunked it up in the air and the whole team celebrated on their floor.”

Score: East Gaston 61, Ashbrook 50. The Warriors ended Ashbrook’s 20-game win streak.

Banner season.

Sumpter recalls playing Burns again in the first round of the state playoffs. “It came down to the last possession, and I turned the ball over and one of my teammates, Aaron Forney, was able to get a block at the other end, and I was able to secure the ball get fouled, and I scored the winning free throw,” he says.

“My job was to stop the opposing player, no matter the height,” Forney says. “I just wanted to help the team the best way I could, which was defense. But I guess I did pretty well on offense. We had a ton of good ballplayers.”

Says Berg: “It was either tied or we were down one and we thought, ‘It’s over,’ and they drove to the basket and Aaron Forney blocked the ball and swatted it toward halfcourt and we got the ball back and scored and ended up winning the game. Guys like him [Forney], maybe he didn’t score all the points or get in the newspaper that much, but he always made the right play when needed.”

East Gaston lost in the second round to TC Roberson in double overtime.

“We set our goals and we went out to do what we said we were going to do,” Berg says.

Now it’s 2023.

There’s a plot twist.

Coach Howell has retired. Eugene Farrar has been head coach since 2011. That 22-5 record has been matched a few times, never broken. But this year, as the Hall of Fame recognizes East Gaston’s banner season of 2002, Farrar’s team broke the record and finished 25-3.

“For a long time, East Gaston was Mount Holly, but Stuart Cramer (High School) is taking that away. We had a phenomenal year. I learned from a coach a long time ago, with records like that you can have a good team, but you also have to have key things go your way,” Farrar says, “whether it be a missed layup by another team, or someone from your team making a shot, and we won several close games. Like Bessemer City, we played them in the conference tournament championship [this year] and won by one in double-overtime (76-75).

“To me, there’s no other high school but East Gaston. If you come to the school and just walk the halls, you’ll hear kids say ‘East Gaston for life.’ The kids I coached throughout the years have been very special, and we have a lot of our alumni still come up there today and just talk about life. I talk to them about life. I tell them they can talk to me about anything, and if I have no clue, I’ll point them in the right direction.

“Those guys [in 2001] who were riding with me, I knew their parents personally, whether to go to church with them or we had gone to school together, and they trusted me. So it was no problem whatsoever.

“It’s been a blessing.” ■

— By Kathy Blake

tAMeRon seAley RushinG

Field Days

Tameron Sealey Rushing excelled in high school, college softball

Tameron Sealey Rushing was a successful three-sport athlete when, in ninth grade, someone suggested a major change to the way she played the game she excelled at most.

Changing her game plan – in sports, in her education, in her life and career – have led Rushing to where she is now and earned her a spot in the Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame.

“I played short stop or second base, and I actually started off right-handed, and as I got older, with my speed, they wanted me to be left-handed,” she says. “It helped me be one step closer to first base. So I began hitting left-handed in ninth grade.”

Rushing, who writes right-handed, played softball and basketball at East Gaston High School from 2004 through 2008 and ran cross-country.

Softball would be her ride to college, her ticket to stacks of awards.

“I was always the small one on the field, so my speed helped,” she says. “I was always one of the smaller ones.”

Rushing played varsity basketball all four years of high school and won East Gaston’s Warrior Award as a senior.

She was all-conference all four years in cross-country. Her identical twin, Hall of Fame inductee Cameron Sealey

Flachofsky, ran cross country as well. Cameron played softball to support her sister, and Tameron played basketball to be with Cameron. “My sister and I had a trick play,” Rushing says. “She played third base and I played short stop, and if there was a runner on third, if I got the ground ball I would fake-throw to first and the runner would take off, and I’d just toss the ball to my sister on third. It’s like we read each other’s minds.

“We said we’d run cross-country to stay in shape, but we ran for Coach (Dale) Starnes, and he quickly figured out we were there to compete and we were going to win. We’d start each race close to the front, and he knew we needed to finish in the top three, and he would get so mad at us.”

“I remember running around the track at Ashbrook,” Cameron says, “and he’d get so mad, because I’d just walk up the last hill, then sprint on the track.”

“He’d get angry,” Tameron says, “but we always finished in front. We told him, ‘We got this. We’re not going to let you down.’”

Tameron’s future husband Mathew also ran cross-country. Coach Starnes would let each athlete paint a cinder block to display in his classroom and theirs are side-by-side.

But, softball.

Rushing was all-Big South 3A/4A Conference in softball every year in high school and was Player of the Year as a senior, when she led the team with a near-.500 batting average in conference games.

She led EGHS in stolen bases her senior year and was cowinner of the team’s Offense Award. She was offered a scholarship to the University of Central Florida, but picked Montreat College’s offer instead. “I didn’t want to leave North Carolina,” she says. “I wanted to be close to home.”

As a Montreat freshman, she was second in the Appalachian Athletic Conference in batting average (.564) and hits and was second in steals. She was AAC all-conference first team and its player of the week twice. She was a Scholar Athlete and Montreat’s Offensive Player of the Year.

That changed.

“I decided I wanted to be a nurse, and Lenoir-Rhyne was still offering the scholarship they offered when I was in high school, so I went there to do nursing,” Rushing says. “At Montreat, though, we had a great season. I had the second-highest batting average in the

conference, but I wanted to do my career path.”

Transferring to a different college usually isn’t difficult. Transcripts are sent, paperwork is done.

That changed, too.

Rushing and Cameron did something Rushing says they never – never – did all through high school.

“When I was trying to get into nursing school, I had to have a class completed over the summer to start the nursing program at Lenoir-Rhyne on time, and I had a softball game I could not miss,” she says. “But I had to be in chemistry lab. But I had to play softball. So my parents made Cameron go to the chemistry lab, and we never did that switch before. We honestly never did that, never played tricks like that. The lab was a summer course, and she just had to go to one class and show her face so they knew I was there.”

Rushing was pre-season second-team All-South Atlantic Conference as a junior and led L-R in stolen bases all three years. She played center field, and had fielding percentages of .1000, .986 and .1000. From 2010 through her senior year of 2012, she led the team in career defensive putouts.

Rushing got her Bachelor’s degree in nursing and followed her career choice to Gaston Memorial Hospital, where she worked for 10 years.

That changed.

Rushing and Matthew have two children – Cooper, 8, and Hayden, 6. She changed jobs and is the school nurse at Gaston Christian School, where her children attend. She recalls her

mother always making sure the sisters had a hot meal and everyone ate as a family prior to traveling to games. She recalls her mom making sure details were taken care of, because the family was always on the go. She recalls playing softball as an 8-year-old on a travel team in Coulwood, because her dad helped coach.

That scenario has changed.

Now, Rushing is always on the go. Cooper plays Dixie Youth Baseball and made the World Series team as a short stop. Hayden takes gymnastics and plays 8-under coach pitch softball. “So I coach, and I pitch,” Rushing says.

On thing that won’t change:

Lenoir-Rhyne recently came out with an All-Decade team for softball, for 2010 through 2019. Rushing made second team.

“It was an honor to see my name there,” she says. ■

— By Kathy Blake

Career Highlights

Tameron

Sealey Rushing

• East Gaston High School (2004-2008): Softball – All-Conference (four years); sophomore -- EGHS co-MVP and 2nd team All-Gazette, .412 batting average; junior –EGHS coaches award; senior – conference player of the year, led team in batting average at near-.500, EGHS co-offense award. Tournament champs. Basketball – played varsity four years; senior – Warrior Award. Cross-Country – All-conference, four years.

• Montreat College (2008-2009): Softball –Led conference in batting average (.564), hits (1.94) and was second in steals (12 of 15); two-time conference player of the week; allconference first team; school offensive player of the year / scholar athlete; started every game at short stop or outfield. Led in runs scored and on-base percentage.

• Lenoir-Rhyne University (2009-2012): Softball – Started 114 games; led team in stolen bases (three years); junior – preseason All-South Atlantic Conference second team.

CAMeRon seAley FlAChoFsty

The Court Agenda

Cameron Sealey Flachofsty excelled in basketball in high school, college and as a coach

It began with innocent, childhood curiosity.

Cameron Sealey was 5. She tagged along with her father, who coached basketball at the local rec center, and discovered she could hold that great big ball and bounce it and throw it high in the air and through the net.

“It got me going, and I was liking it. I thought, I really like this because I can keep up with the boys,” Sealey says. “It was co-ed.”

Fast forward to high school.

Sealey played point guard and shooting guard for East Gaston from 2004-2005 through her senior season, 2008. She was All Big South Conference every year; All-Gazette first team three times, second team once. She made the Charlotte Observer’s All-Gaston second team twice, its All-Regional team as a junior and was East Gaston’s MVP her senior year when she averaged 14 points per game, 5.6 assists and 3.2 rebounds. She received NCHSAA Scholar Athlete recognition and was invited

to play in the 16th-annual Charlotte Pro-Am All-Star Classic.

“I just remember that’s when I truly learned what hard work was, through my coach Ernie Bridges, and that’s when I realized I wanted to do it in college,” she says. “I think my mentality changed a little bit, and I thought, if I want to get there, I need to do this. My parents helped me a ton and let me also play AAU basketball and provided the funds to do that. I was playing with Carolina Express, and we started the recruitment process.”

Basketball wasn’t her only uniform. Sealey also ran high school cross-country and played softball.

Her success in high school, college and, later, as a college coach has earned her a spot in the Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame.

“I know in high school, my parents didn’t miss a game and I think in college, between my parents and grandparents, if I added all my games all four years of college, my parents and grandparents may have missed 10 game all together,” she says. “They made it fun.”

Cameron Sealey wasn’t the only athlete in the house. Her twin sister, Tameron, played softball and basketball and ran cross-country. Tameron – also a Hall of Fame inductee –excelled in softball.

“We did cross-country to stay in shape,” Cameron says. “I did softball to be with my sister, and she played basketball to be with me.

“We never set still.”

Sealey received a bachelor’s degree in sports management from Lenoir-Ryne, with a minor in psychology. She had an immediate impact on the college’s basketball team, playing in 31 of 32 games and averaging 8.1 points, 3.7 rebounds and 2.4 assists as a freshman. She averaged 11.6 points her sophomore year and 17.9 points as a junior, when she led the team with 50 steals and was All-South Atlantic Conference second team.

Her senior year, 2011-2012, she was first team all-conference, led the team with 45 steals, was conference player-of-the-week twice, All-Southeast Regional second team and was MVP of the 2011 Mount McKinley Bank North Star Invitational Championship, held in Fairbanks, Alaska.

After graduation, Sealey traded her uniform for a clipboard. She was assistant coach at the University of PittsburghJohnstown in 2012-2013, then spent two seasons as assistant coach at the University of South Carolina-Aiken, then one year as assistant at Georgia State University in Atlanta while earning her master’s degree in athletic administration from Concordia (PA) University.

In 2017, she became the head women’s basketball coach at Lenoir-Rhyne University. Her 2019 team reached the South Atlantic Conference tournament semifinals. She resigned in March 2020. She was 27.

“The difference between playing and coaching is, with coaching, you have no control over the [scoring in the] game. People like to think we do, but it’s the people with the ball – and that was really hard to adjust to,” she says. “I was in administration and training staff and managing people older than me, and I was one of the youngest head coaches.”

She knew basketball wouldn’t last forever, and when COVID-19 hit, she felt it was time to explore options. “I just think that, at the time, I didn’t know that getting out of coaching was what I needed, but then I realized, between COVID and resigning, that that was what was supposed to happen with my life,” she says. “My fiancé, now husband, and I talked about it.”

She thought basketball was behind her – but got a call from Belmont Abbey and was assistant coach there a year before switching gears for good.

She and her husband, Nick Flachofsky, started a business – Safeway Traffic Control – which provides road services for communities and businesses, such as planning and marking road closures, work zones, alternate routes and redirection of traffic to ensure safety for the general public and emergency response teams.

“I realized I didn’t have time to coach anymore,” she says. “I got married and not long after that, I got pregnant.”

A whole new gameplan.

“The Hall of Fame is a great honor. When I got the job at

Lenoir-Ryne, my opening statement was how life came full circle,” she says. “I started playing basketball, then I was coaching it. But I think now, this is where my circle completes. My home, my family, my business, living near my parents and grandparents and the peace that I feel. I think to be honored in Mount Holly is special. The people here have had a huge impact on my life.”

Rewind, to innocent, childhood curiosity.

Sealey and Nick have an 11-month-old daughter.

She’s too tiny to hold that great big ball and throw it high into the air, but … Stay tuned. ■

— By Kathy Blake

Career Highlights

Cameron Sealey Flachofskey

• East Gaston High School 2004-2008: Basketball – freshman, all-conference team, all-Gazette first team, Observer all-Gaston 2nd team, EGHS offense award; sophomore, all-conference, First Charter Holiday Classic all-tournament, all-Gazette 2nd team, Observer all-Gaston 2nd team, EGHS co-MVP; junior, conference player of the year, all-conference team, all-Gazette team, Observer all-region, Holiday Classic MVP, EGHS co-MVP; senior, all-conference, all-Gazette first team, EGHS MVP, NCHSAA scholar athlete, East-West all-star game, Charlotte Pro-Am All-Star Classic. Cross-Country – All-Conference team (4 years); Softball – freshman, all-conference 3A/4A team; sophomore, co-MVP, Big South all-conference, All-Gazette second team; junior co-MVP, all-conference; senior – co-offense award, all-conference.

• Lenoir-Rhyne University 2008-2012: freshman, started 31-of-32 games, 8.1 ppg, 3.7 reb., 2.4 assists; sophomore, started 22-of-26 games, 11.6 ppg, 5.3 reb., totaled 55 assists; junior, led team with 50 steals, all-conference 2nd team, 17.9 ppg, 5.3 rebounds, total of 70 assists; senior, led team with 45 steals. Allconference first team, two-time conference player of the week, all-southeast regional 2nd team, 16.1 ppg, 5.6 rebounds, totaled 64 assists. Bachelor’s degree, Sports Management.

• Concordia University: Master’s degree, Athletic Administration (2014-2016).

• Coaching : 2012-13 – University of PittsburghJohnstown, assistant coach; 2013-2015 – University of South Carolina-Aiken, assistant coach; 20152016 – Georgia State University, assistant coach / recruiting coordinator; 2016-2017: Wofford College, assistant coach / recruiting coordinator; LenoirRhyne – 2017-2020, head coach; Belmont Abbey –2021, assistant coach.

In 2023

The Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame Supports these non-proﬁts.

Mt. Holly Community

Relief Organization

Mt. Holly

Middle School Athletics

Stuart Cramer

High School Basketball

Ida Rankin Elementary Safety Patrol

Mount Holly Athletic Association

Home of the Road Runners

For its continued support.

The Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame

The Mount Holly Sports Hall of Fame is a 501(c)3 organization that celebrates Mount Holly’s rich sports history and supports future athletes through its work with local organizations. Classiﬁed as a public charity, we welcome your tax deductible gifts. In addition to our practice of supporting local charities, we are also funding college scholarships for deserving local students.