ORANGEBURG - Airport High School offensive coordinator/offensive line coach Preston Deaver agreed on April 24 to take the head football coaching job at Edisto High School.

This is his first head coaching position after 12 years as an assistant coach.

By the next day, he was at Edisto High School, meeting with returning Cougars football players, faculty and staff. He showed the 60-65 players he met a schedule and told them of the basic plan for spring and summer workouts.

“It was a whirlwind day for me, but it was great to get to Edisto and meet people and spend all morning there,” Deaver said. “We had a great turnout of returning players, a very warm welcome from the faculty and staff and teachers and administrators and coaches and cafeteria ladies and even the janitor.

“It has long been a dream of mine to be a head coach. It’s been fast moving and new experiences for me, but I embrace it. Even the folks at Airport are congratulating me and supporting me in this opportunity.”

Deaver replaces Chris Carter, who coached the Cougars the past three seasons. He stepped down in November to concentrate on his athletic director duties at Edisto.

Carter’s Edisto teams posted a 7-21 record the past three years. The Cougars compete in Region 5-3A with Lexington County teams Gilbert, Pelion and Swansea along with last year’s champion Strom Thurmond.

Edisto went 0-10 for the second straight season in 2015 and entered Carter’s first season at the school with then the Palmetto State’s longest losing streak at 22 games.

The 2013 season, the Cougars’ last under current Orange-burg Prep head coach Andy Palmer, was the last time Edisto had a winning record. The team went 6-4. It marked the only winning season the program has had in the past decade.

“Edisto has a great mix of linemen and skill guys, size and speed,” Deaver said. “Coach Carter has done a great job of turning things around here, and I want to build on that.

“We’re going to be a tough, physical football team in all phases of the game, finding ways to play well and win. We’re going to try to build on that Edisto pride. I could tell it was there on campus today. I want to build on that desire to have an elite program here.”

Before coaching the past six seasons at Airport, Deaver was an assistant coach at other Columbia-area schools including Ridge View (his alma mater), Brookland-Cayce and Blythewood.

Having proven himself as a top assistant at Class 5A and 4A programs in South Carolina High School League competition, familiarity for the Edisto coaching search committee stemmed from Deaver once coaching on current school principal Brad Coleman’s staff when Coleman was a coach and athletic director at Brookland-Cayce.

“I coached Deaver in football and baseball at Ridge View High School,” Airport head coach Kirk Burnett said. “He is a man of a great heart and extreme passion for what he does. He is always learning as much as he can about high school football and the overall picture of education in general.

“He is and will be very successful in teaching and coaching football. I had no doubt that one day he would be a Head Coach when the time was right for him.”

Bo Bowers will take up Deaver’s position at Airport. Meanwhile, Plans are for Edisto to start spring practice on Monday.

“I’m going to (figuratively) pass the ball off and he (Deaver) will have a principal who has been an AD and an AD who has been head football coach supporting him,” Carter said.” We will see that he gets what he needs to be successful.

“I think for most of the kids here, the transition will be easier. They are asking questions and they realize it’s different when a coach is passing a program off to the next coach, instead of being fired and being gone from the program altogether.”

Carter believes Deaver will have sufficient time this spring to put a workout schedule in place for the summer months, and he will have a chance to get his coaching staff in place during the summer.

“He is an offensive guy who can be really effective and can help Edisto and the offense progress, getting the offensive line to set up the running game, which, in turn, will aid the passing game,” Carter said. “We have a good stable of backs and a good quarterback coming back. But the offensive line is key.