Coaching carousel spinning - as usual - for several local schools

The end of school comes with it the annual inflow and outflow of teachers and coaches in school districts everywhere.

Kingfisher County is no exception.

While we’ll have more on the new teachers in our Aaron Norton will be Tyler Tuck.

Tuck makes the move from Okarche, where he was a baseball assistant under Ryan Beaman.

Okarche – Tuck’s spot has been filled by Matt Yost.

Yost was most recently an assistant baseball coach at Yukon and is a one-time head coach at his alma mater, Elk City. (Note: During his career at Elk City, Yost carried a .512 batting average, which included .644 his senior year.)

Cashion - The Wildcats will have a new face for their wrestling program and it’s a familiar one for people in Kingfisher.

Fay Barnett has been named the new head wrestling coach as he takes over for Steven Wilson, who resigned earlier this spring.

Barnett spent last year as the head girls wrestling coach at Yukon. He was also an assistant for the boys program.

Prior to that, Barnett spent several years as the co-head wrestling coach at Kingfisher and before that was the head coach at Carl Albert for 14 years.

The only other departure, currently, from the Cashion coaching ranks is former football assistant Brian Archer, now the head coach at Burns Flat-Dill City.

However, several new hires have been made.

Brady Johnson, formerly a Hennessey basketball assistant, will serve as a boys basketball and baseball assistant for the Wildcats. His fiancé, Hannah Wade, will be a girls basketball assistant at Cashion.

Nick Julkowski, who has spent the last handful of years at Chandler, will be a part of the football, wrestling and baseball staffs.

Sean Wear, recently the head wrestling coach at Northwest Classen, will be an assistant under Barnett and will also coach junior high track.

Brandy Chavez will be a softball assistant coach. She comes to Cashion from Davenport.

Kingfisher - The door opened up for Nance to return to Dover after Dylan Blundell stepped down as the Longhorns’ baseball coach.

That’s because Blundell is returning to his own almamater, Kingfisher.

Blundell will coach junior high football and assist his father, Stan Blundell, with baseball. He’ll also be a part of the wrestling coaching staff.

Another coach returning to his roots is Timothy Winans.

Winans most recently was a part of the football staff of the re-emerging Piedmont program.

He’ll coach football at KHS and will also be the head coach for the boys track and field team.

There were two departures from the football staff: Stuart Purintun and Bryan Dutton.

Purintun is taking over as the new junior high principal. Dutton, also the head wrestling coach, left the district to take a position in Rogers, Ark.

Winans will fill Dutton’s football role. Veteran coach David Ellis, who primarily helped with junior high last year, will take the spot filled by Purintun.

Jacob Farrell is no stranger to Kingfisher baseball fans as he’s been a part of Blundell’s program in recent years. Farrell, yet another KHS alumn, was recently hired full-time by the district and will continue to help with baseball as well as wrestling and junior high football.

Farrell has been helping with baseball in the summers since 2018. He worked last year full-time as a paraprofessional with the district, but was recently hired as a P.E. teacher here.

Morgan Marks Dutton coached junior high softball, girls basketball and track and was a high school girls basketball assistant in her one year here. She also took a job at Rogers, Ark. Carol Craven was recently hired to fill those coaching spots.

The search for Bryan Dutton’s replacement as the head wrestling coach is ongoing.

That search is now headed by David Glover, the district’s new superintendent.

Glover was originally hired in May to be the district’s athletic director to take over for Jay Wood, who is leaving to be Dover’s superintendent.

Glover was then hired last week to take over as superintendent after the resignation of Dr. Daniel Craig.

Hennessey – Keith Fletcher will fill the void left by Johnson’s departure for Cashion on the boys basketball staff. Fletcher will also coach cross country and track. He most recently was a coach at Blackwell.

Carrie Schwarz is the Lady Eagles’ new volleyball coach. She’ll also serve as an assistant for the girls basketball and track programs.

Joining the football staff is Paul Raupe, who will also aid the track program for the Eagles.

(Ed. note: Lomega’s coaching staffs remain unchanged.)