Austin High School adds new head women’s basketball and baseball coaches

DECATUR, Ala. (WHNT) — Two new coaches will lead the Black Bears women’s basketball and baseball teams over the next year.

On Monday afternoon, the Decatur City Schools Board of Education (DCSBOE) approved the hiring of two Austin High School (AHS) coaches at their called meeting.

The Lady Black Bears basketball team will now be led by former Austin Brian Davis, who served as an assistant coach for the AHS women’s basketball team from 2020 to 2022.

Davis was a member of Austin’s 1996 final four team and was named an AHSAA All-State. His wife Alma, also an AHS graduate, is a former Lady Black Bear basketball player. The couple have twins, who will be juniors at AHS next year.

“I’m humbled, excited and grateful for this opportunity,” said Coach Davis.

Davis has been an assistant basketball coach at AHS since 2013. He has been helping the women’s team since 2020, but before that he was on the men’s basketball team.

In 2012, Davis was an assistant coach for the Sparkman High School boys’ basketball team, which finished second in the state tournament that year.

Austin’s new baseball head coach, Hunter Smothers, is a guy who knows Class 7A, Zone 8 very well.

Smothers has spent the past six years as a pitching coach at Bob Jones High School. During his tenure, the Patriots reached the elite eight twice, the bottom four once, and were runners-up once.

Pitchers under Smothers set school records for strikeouts in 2019 (391) and 2023 (413).

Bob Jones also had 32 varsity signers while Smothers was an assistant coach, 12 of whom went to Division I schools. The teams set the school record for wins in 2018 with 36 and 2019 with 42 while Smothers did also part of the staff.