Former Battery Creek standout to be named football coach at A.C. Flora

A.C. Flora appears to have found its next football coach.

Beaufort native and former Charleston Southern standout Collin Drafts will be the Falcons’ new coach, according to sources with knowledge of the situation. The move is expected to become official at Tuesday’s Richland 1 board meeting.

According to the Orlando Sentinel, Drafts resigned his position as football coach at East River High near Orlando, Fla., to take a head coaching job in Columbia, but he wouldn’t publicly say which school it was.

Drafts replaces Reggie Shaw, who left to become the coach at Byrnes High in January.

The former Battery Creek standout and son of longtime Dolphins AD John Drafts was coach at East River last season. Before that, he spent five seasons as offensive coordinator at Olympia and West Orange high schools in Orlando, under head coach Bob Head.

In three years at West Orange, Drafts’ offenses averaged 42 points per game and ranked in the top five in the state in scoring.

The 31-year-old Drafts turned East River around in one season, going from 1-9 to 6-5 and a trip to the postseason.

“It’s just one of those things that is definitely a little bittersweet ,” Drafts told the Orlando Sentinel.

“It’s just one of those situations where an opportunity presented itself and it was an offer that I couldn’t turn down.”

Drafts founded Quarterback Nation and coached or worked with Florida State quarterback Deondre Francois, Auburn’s Woody Barrett and BYU’s Hayden Griffitts, among others.

Drafts, the Island Packet/Beaufort Gazette’s Offensive Player of the Year in 2002, was a four-year starter at quarterback for Charleston Southern. He earned Big South Player of the Year in 2005 as he helped the Buccaneers to a share of the conference title, and finished his career with 9,768 passing yards and 73 touchdowns.

After college, Drafts played two seasons in the Arena Football League for the Orlando Predators. In 2011, Drafts was inducted into the Charleston Southern Hall of Fame and will be part of the next class for the Big South Hall of Fame.

A.C. Flora went 6-6 this past season and went to the second round of the Class 4A playoffs after knocking off No. 2 Myrtle Beach..

This story was originally published March 11, 2017 at 10:52 AM with the headline "Former Battery Creek standout to be named football coach at A.C. Flora."