Austin American-Statesman

Reagan High hires football coach from Spring Woods

- By Thomas Jones tdjones@statesman.com statesman.com

Reagan High School has hired former Spring Woods offensive coordinato­r A.J. Mustafa as its new head coach and campus athletic coordinato­r, according to Dave Campbell’s Texas Football.

Mustafa, a 16-year coaching veteran who is a graduate of Stephen F. Austin University.

Mustafa replaces Keith Carey, who cited family reasons for resigning earlier this year. In his six seasons at Reagan, Carey led the Raiders to a 19-42 record and three playoff berths. That modest success marked a monumental achievemen­t for a team that won one game in the three seasons before the arrival of Carey and suffered from declining participat­ion rates.

Reagan went 2-8 last season, including 2-4 in District 25-5A. The Raiders will compete in District 12-5A Division I this upcoming season against fellow Austin school district teams McCallum, Lanier, LBJ, Crockett and Travis, as well as Seguin and Dripping Springs.

Luling to hire West Texan as new football coach, athletic director: Former Slaton coach Stacey Martin will be Luling’s new head football coach and athletic director, according to Dave Campbell’s Texas Football.

Martin replaces Scott Campbell, who accepted the head coaching job at the West Texas town of Clyde in May after three seasons at Luling. Campbell led the Class 3A Eagles to a 13-19 record and two district titles in his tenure.

Martin, a native of Big Spring who spent two seasons at Slaton, brings a lengthy and varied career to Luling. A 20-year coaching veteran, Martin has a career record of 51-46 in nine seasons as a head coach at a trio of Class 3A schools that includes Alpine, Coahoma and Slaton. He has also worked as an assistant at schools such as Class 6A powers Los Fresnos and Odessa Permian.

Martin led Slaton to a 6-6 record this past season, which included the school’s first playoff victory in 11 years.

Luling went 4-6 last season. This school year, the Eagles will compete in District 14-3A Division I with Edna, Goliad, Hallettsvi­lle, Industrial and Yoakum.

La Grange promotes assistant softball coach to head position: La Grange has promoted assistant softball coach Amanda Arlund to the head coaching spot, according to Fayette County radio station KTIM. Arlund replaces Sharon Vinklarek, who retired following a second stint as the coach for the Leopards’ storied softball program.

Arlund becomes the third head coach in four years for La Grange, a traditiona­l powerhouse that has won three state championsh­ips.

Vinklarek first coached La Grange from 1995 to 2005 and led the team to the Class 3A state championsh­ip in her final season.

Coach Arthur Behrend led the Leopards to 205 wins and two state titles in a sixyear tenure that ended with a contentiou­s departure following the 2016 season. Behrend took over the program of nearby Giddings, and Vinklarek rejoined the softball program as head coach.

Vandegrift assistant named Hendrickso­n’s girls soccer coach: Hendrickso­n didn’t have to look far to find a replacemen­t for departed girls soccer coach Rennie Rebe, who led the Hawks to the school’s only state championsh­ip in a team sport in 2017.

Angela Fulton, the former head girls soccer coach of Lockhart who spent the past two seasons as the top assistant for Vandegrift’s powerful girls soccer program, will replace Rebe, according to a tweet by the Pflugervil­le school district June 20.

A two-time district coach of the year during her tenure at Lockhart, Fulton also served as the girls residentia­l coach at SMU’s touted soccer camp as well as the day camp director for SMU’s men’s soccer program. She also has a lengthy playing career that includes starting every match as a freshman at the University of Texas-El Paso and competing for Austin’s women’s profession­al team, The Nationals.

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