Weaver moves
- Updated: May 28, 2025
Knight, former Weaver assistant, returns to coach girls’ wrestling. Brannon steps up to the plate to coach baseball.
New head coaches in Calhoun County system
Varsity head coaches hired by the Calhoun County Board of Education for the 2025-26 school year:
—Clint Smith, head football coach, White Plains
—Jameson Edwards, head baseball coach, White Plains
—Blake Jennings, head football coach, Ohatchee
—Jake Welch, head baseball coach, Ohatchee
—Cooper Austin, head boys’ basketball coach, Ohatchee.
—Dustin Screws, (volunteer) head wrestling coach, Ohatchee (pending Background check and AHSAA credentials)
—Marcus Herbert, head boys basketball coach, Pleasant Valley
—Chris Youngman, head cross country coach, Pleasant Valley
—Shannon Felder, head football coach, Saks
—David Floyd, head softball coach, Saks
—Michelle Martin, head volleyball coach, Saks
—Justin Brown, head boys wrestling coach, Weaver
—Wynn Knight, head girls wrestling coach, Weaver
—Kolby Brannon, head baseball coach, Weaver
ELSEWHERE
—Jeremy Sullivan, head football coach, Jacksonville
—Taylor Hayes, head baseball coach, Jacksonville
—Chelsea Mize, head boys’ and girls’ soccer coach, Jacksonville
—Anna Goodwin, head cross country coach, Jacksonville
By Joe Medley
East Alabama Sports Today
Weaver continues to fill its coaching vacancies.
The Calhoun County Board of Education on Wednesday approved the hirings of Wynn Knight as head coach of girls’ wrestling and Kolby Brannon as head baseball coach.
Knight takes over for Justin Brown, who became Weaver’s boys’ wrestling coach after long-time head coach Andy Fulmer resigned to accept a job at Cleburne County.
Brannon takes over for Thomas Lamb, who coached the Bearcats’ baseball team for one season.
Fulmer also coached Weaver’s softball program the past two seasons, and that vacancy remains unfilled.
Knight, 32, takes over the reigning Class 1A-5A state-championship girls’ wrestling program. The Bearcats won the first-ever AHSAA-sanctioned state title for girls’ wrestling in February.
Five-time state champion Lena Johannson graduated last week, but Weaver is due to return most of its team.
“It’s awesome, especially the first year of it being sanctioned, that they were able to get it done,” Knight said. “With girls’ wrestling growing as rapidly as it is, for them to be on the front lines of it, especially having such a traditioned program already in wrestling, it’s pretty awesome to get to kind of step in and be the next chapter in that.”
Knight was head wrestling coach and an assistant in football at Southside before coming back to Weaver, where he began his coaching career as an assistant. The Opelika graduate was also head wrestling coach at Piedmont for a year.
He’ll be an assistant coach in football at Weaver.
“I live in Weaver,” Knight said. “My son goes to Weaver Elementary. We go to the Weaver Congregational Methodist Church, and my wife is a Weaver alum.
“When I was an assistant there, I did my student teaching under Andy, and he helped me out a ton. I was having a good time at Southside, but I thought it was time to focus on the family.”
Brannon, 29, comes to Weaver from Gaylesville, where he coached baseball plus boys’ and girls’ basketball.
The Trojans’ baseball team went 9-13 this season and finished as Class 1A, Area 12 runner-up to Spring Garden, clinching a playoff berth for the first time since 2019.
In basketball, Brannon coached both the boys and girls squads in 2024-25.
During the 2023-24 season, Gaylesville’s boys posted their first Cherokee County Tournament runner-up finish since 1988. They also fell a game short of an area championship, which also would’ve been their first since 1988.
Gaylesville did, however, reach the sub-regional round that season, which came to an end with a loss at Faith Christian.
Between the basketball and baseball programs, Brannon coached the Trojans to 62 wins.
Brannon graduated from Boaz High School and Miles College. He had coaching stops at Valley Head, Gadsden City and Gaston before Gaylesville. He was an assistant in baseball at Gadsden City, and Gaylesville was his first head-coaching job in baseball.
“It was one of those situations where I was just looking for something new and trying to find somewhere where they had a good young core,” Brannon said. “Everything I had looked and and talked to said they had a good young core of kids coming up.
“With me helping with football and meeting with Coach (Ken) Cofer, he just seemed like a really good, down-to-Earth guy. In that interview, the admin (Principal Tracy Brazier) and erverbpody just seemed fantastic. It’s one of those places where you walk in the door and feel at home immediately.”
You must be logged in to post a comment Login