Wolverine History: The Lady Wolverines, South Carolina's First Girls' Basketball Dynasty

Part six of The Woodruff Times series "Moments That Changed Wolverine History," written by Garrett Mitchell and published January 20, 2021, tells the story of the town's first sports dynasty. That dynasty was in girls' basketball, not football. Here is our summary.

Willie Varner is best known for 10 football state championships over 42 years. From 1955 to 1967, though, he also coached the Woodruff High girls' basketball team. His teams won state titles in 1963, 1964, 1966 and 1967, which the paper calls the first girls' basketball dynasty in South Carolina. His girls' teams went 208-49-5 over 12 seasons.

The game was different then. Girls played a divided half-court format: three offensive players stayed at one end and three defenders at the other, and no one could cross the center line. The article notes that the rules reflected the era's assumptions about female athletes. The full-court, five-on-five game came in 1971.

The paper credits several players. Beth (Rentz) Grant and Jill (Page) Singleton led the scoring on the 1963 and 1964 title teams. Woodruff beat Moultrie 44-40 in 1963 and St. Andrews 43-33 in 1964. A 22-1 team fell to Newberry in the 1965 semifinals. The 1965-66 team went 23-0 for the third title. The 1967 team, expected to rebuild with only two returning starters, went 22-2, beat Hanahan, and won the fourth title, with Lauren Murphy and Brenda (Gossett) Fletcher among its stars. The players describe Varner as demanding but fair, a coach who stressed unity over individual glory.

The 1967 title was the last state championship won by a Woodruff basketball team, according to the article, and it was Varner's last season coaching girls. He then focused on football and won seven more titles. Grant finished as the school's all-time leading scorer and later spent almost three decades as a Woodruff High guidance counselor.

The full story, with team photos, is at The Woodruff Times link below.