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Napoleon Cobb's Final Year Coaching SW Dekalb Panthers
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"It is early in the season. They can go faster!” Napoleon Cobb Southwest Dekalb Track Coach Those ten words are great news for the Panthers track team and fans, and some scary news for teams that will soon have to compete against the speedy Southwest Dekalb relay team. At a recent meet the four man crew of Jaylen Muhammad, Justin Tomlin, and twins Terry and Terryon Conwell posted the three fastest times this year in the 4 by 100m, 4 by 200m, and 4 by 400m relay events. The head coach of the Panthers is a legend in the track world. Napoleon Cobb is now in his 51st year of coaching track. His first job was at the old Gordon High School which is now McNair High. He then went to Morehouse College, and landed at Southwest Dekalb in 1989. Southwest Dekalb won one state title before he arrived in 1987, but since taking over the program he has coached his runners to a level of excellence that is unmatched, with 8 state titles coming in 1990, 1992,1993,1995,1996,1997, 2007 and in 2015. In fact, last year was his fiftieth year in coaching and he was about to do a John Elway/Peyton Manning and walk away with a title in his final year, but his coaches and players convinced him to come back for one final season in 2016. Having speedy twins Terry and Terryon Conwell coming back for their junior years made that decision a little easier. So Coach Cobb is back and very proud of his team. “These young men have so much potential, I am excited about watching them grow daily and improve”. Coach Cobb and his staff are careful not to “over run” his athletes. He says his best team was the Deangelo Taylor led state champs of 1996, and he says the records his current players are breaking are from that 1996 squad. Jaylen Muhammad is the lone senior among the sprinters, the Conwell twins have a ton of potential, and Justin Tomlin who is a sophomore is also the starting quarterback on the football team. And while we are talking Southwest Dekalb football, Coach Cobb points out that he and former longtime Panthers football coach Buck Godfrey are long-time friends. In fact, the two men, the two coaching legends, the two winningest coaches in their school’s history were born on exactly the same day, at exactly the same time of day (5:45 pm) in the same year. Now that’s a pretty cool coincidence. As for all the great athletes that he has coached and all the state titles his teams have won Coach Cobb says “I am humbly proud of all the state titles and accomplishments. But this team is special. I want to give them the vision of how good they can become. If they work hard they have the speed and talent to be the best team not just in Georgia but in the country. They have great wheels, they just have to believe they are the best, and that’s part of my job” So good luck to the Southwest Dekalb Panthers and to Coach Napoleon Cobb. This year they are not just racing state and national record times, but they are racing history as well.
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