Lamar Rogers Approaches 1,000 Wins

Lamar Rogers, the head girls' basketball coach at Clarkrange High School, enters tonight's game against Bledsoe County with 999 career wins as a head coach. Rogers began his coaching career in 1977 at Clarkrange, and has remained there for all 36 years of his career. Rogers has led Clarkrange to 8 state basketball championships (1983, 1984, 1985, 1990, 1991, 1995, 2004, 2009) and one state runner-up finish in 2008

Jim Smiddy, the former Bradley Central coach, is the only other coach in Tennessee to compile more victories than Rogers. Smiddy finished his career at Bradley Central with a record of 1217-206.

Rogers, who was inducted into the TSSAA Hall of Fame in 2009, is currently 6th all-time in the national high school record book for all-time wins. The top five list of coaches with the most wins all-time is:

1345 Leta Andrews (Grandbury) TX 1962-2011 (1,345-317) [80.9%]

1217 Jim Smiddy (Charleston, TN; Cleveland Bradley Central) TN 1948-93 (1,217-206) [85.5%]

1152 Bertha Teague (Ada Byng) OK 1928-70 (1,152-115) [90.9%]

1100 Joe Lombard (Canyon) TX 1978-2011 (1,100) [91.8%]

1063 Thednall Hill (Hardy Highland) AR 1952-86 (1,063-122) [89.7%]