Six area schools are looking for head football coaches.

Holly Springs boys

Finished second in the Clayton Holiday Invitational. Defeated Bunn in round one, lost to Clayton 61-58 in the championship on Tuesday.

Holly Springs girls

Finished second in the Clayton Holiday Invitational. Defeated Southern Vance in round one, lost to Clayton in championship on Tuesday 52-30.

Athens Drive girls

Finished second in the Athens Drive Winter Holiday Classic. Defeated Ravenscroft in round one, lost to Southeast Raleigh 44-35 on Tuesday.

Middle Creek girls

Won the Time Warner Cable Classic in Wilmington, N.C. Defeated Wilmington Hoggard in round one, Havelock in round two and Fayetteville Westover in the championship game on Wednesday.

Things are getting crazy in the Tri-Nine. Apex, Middle Creek, Cary,
Panther Creek and Holly Springs all have one conference loss apiece,
making this week's rankings next to impossible to sort through. Panther
Creek beat Apex, which beat Holly Springs, which beat Panther Creek.

Nobody has a long enough resume' to justify staying put in their spot
for too long, so I'm a big fan of moving teams up and down multiple
spots in the early season. But it's hard to move anybody when the
surrounding teams all have wins and losses in the past week.

So let me introduce to you the first five-way tie for first the SWakeSports blog has ever seen, and hopefully will ever have.

BOYS BASKETBALL RANKINGS:

Holly Springs Golden Hawks

Last year: 2-9 (1-6 Greater Neuse Conference)

All-Conference players graduated: LB Dan Collins (Greater Neuse River Conference Co-Defensive Player of the Year), TE/SS Alex Dolan (honorable mention), QB Mark Collins (honorable mention)

All-Conference players returning: RB J.J. Graves, LB/WR Xavier Bailey

Carlos Rodon, junior, Holly Springs baseball 

Carlos Rodon, a 6-foot-2, 192-pound junior baseball pitcher/first baseman at Holly Springs High, committed to N.C. State this week.

Last spring as a sophomore, Rodon hit .330 with four home runs and 30 RBI. Rodon was one of six sophomore starters for the three-year-old program that went 19-6 this year.

As a pitcher, he was 2-1 during his sophomore season and posted 67 strikeouts in 40 innings as a freshman.

In a one-week span this year against Fuquay-Varina and Panther Creek, Rodon had two homers with 11 RBI. 

Carlos Rodon, a 6-foot-2, 192-pound junior baseball pitcher and first baseman at Holly Springs, committed to N.C. State this week.

Last spring as a sophomore, Rodon hit .330 with four home runs and 30 RBI.

As a pitcher, he was 2-1 as a sophomore. He posted 67 strikeouts and 40 innings as a freshman.

We gave you the breakdown for the northern half of the conference on Thursday, so now it's time to look along Highway 55 and farther south for the rest of the Tri-9 football teams and their schedules for the upcoming year.

Graduated Holly Springs football player Dan Collins was named to the North Carolina East-West All-Star game, making him the first player in school history to receive such an honor. Collins plans on walking-on to East Carolina's football team next year.

I've got some sad news to pass along.

Luther Johnson, most recently the former principal of Holly Springs High School, died Friday after a long illness. He was 39.

Johnson was also a past principal of Leesville Road Middle School and an assistant principal at Wakefield High School.

We've got new principals tonight at Holly Springs High, Davis Drive Elementary and Wildwood Forest Elementary and an interim leader at Carver Elementary.

Timothy Lee Locklair will become principal of Holly Springs High, replacing Luther Johnson, who left due to health issues. Locklair has been the principal of Apex Middle since 2004 and previously was a high school teacher and assistant principal in Moore County.

Locklair will receive a salary of $95,902.