By Thomas Grant Jr.
Gray Collegiate Academy closed out its time in Class 2A on a championship note.
The school won four state titles during the 2023-24 school year. Competitive cheer repeated as champion, the boys’ basketball team claimed its sixth title in seven years, the girls track and field team won for the first time and softball was crowned champions for the second time in three years.
Add runner-up finishes in boys soccer and football and the War Eagles amassed the second-most points in Class 2A in this past school year’s Carlisle Cup.
Conducted by the South Carolina Athletic Administrators Association and renamed after the longtime Eastside athletics director John Carlisle, the cup is awarded to a school in each classification which demonstrates the highest level of athletic success through the school year.
Finishing ahead of Gray Collegiate was sister charter school Oceanside Collegiate. The Landsharks defeated the War Eagles in two of the three state finals it faced each other during this past school year.
There will be a new Carlisle Cup champion in Class 2A this school year. Because of a new multiplier formula used to determine school attendance, Gray Collegiate will move up to Class 4A while Oceanside Collegiate moves to Class 3A.
“Gray Collegiate is ecstatic about finishing second overall in Class 2A, which is our highest finish ever in the Carlisle Cup,” War Eagle boys soccer coach and athletics director Kevin Heise said. “The 2023-2024 class has set the bar high, and we will aim to match that achievement as we move to Class AAAA this school year!”
Mid-Carolina rounded out the Top 10 thanks to a state runner-up finish in baseball.
In Class 3A, Gilbert finished in seventh place and the lone Lexington County team in the Top 10.
CLASS 5A CARLISLE CUP 2023-24 FINAL TOP 10 STANDINGS
1. Oceanside Collegiate – 1120
2. Gray Collegiate – 940
3. Bishop England – 920
4. Academic Magnet – 620
5 (tie). Chesnee & Landrum – 550
7. Greer Middle College – 480
8. Andrew Jackson – 430
9. Fox Creek – 420
10. Mid-Carolina – 390
Gray Collegiate girls track and field team courtesy of S.C. High School League
Photos by Thomas Grant Jr.
