Hidden icon: Veteran coach Lang key mentor for southside basketball
Ron Lang coached FAMU High to three state titles in the 1990s and has coached at three different middle schools.
There have been a litany of high school coaches to come through Tallahassee and leave an indelible mark, creating legacies that last well beyond their years.
The history books have been kind to them, recording their accomplishments across various sports for others to remember.
Gene Cox. Jake Gaither. Harry Jacobs. Mike Hickman. Jesse Forbes. Gary Droze. Many others.
Like most great coaches, the limelight has never Ron Lang’s focal point.
But unless you have an affinity for youth basketball, you might not even know who he is.
Who Lang is, is a southside icon.
Other than being born in Tampa, Lang’s been a mainstay on the Florida A&M campus, where his father Bobby Lang coached track and field for 40 years.
“I only lived there a hot second, but I’ve been here the rest of my life,” Lang said. “I went to nursery school, elementary school, high school and college at FAMU. I only know orange and green. I was born a Rattler and I’ll die a Rattler.”
Lang, 58, has spent more than 35 years coaching basketball and giving back to the community around him.
He’s been the head coach at Rickards High and FAMU High, as well as the head coach at Nims Middle, Griffin Middle and the now-closed Bellevue Middle.
Lang’s Rattlers teams won three of the school’s six state titles (1994, 1995, 1997) and were state runner-up in 1992.
In fact, Lang played on two state-championship FAMU High teams in 1974 and 1976 under legendary-in-his-own-right coach Johnnie Williams, who became a second father.
“It didn’t matter what classification we were, we could compete with anybody,” Lang said. “When I coached, we could have gone 30-0 every single year, truthfully, if we’d just played our 1A classification. But I wanted the best for my players and I wanted them to develop, so we took on almost anybody anywhere.”
Because of his father and Williams, Lang said it was destiny for him to become a good coach.
“My father was a tough guy and he wanted you to be tough and never back down,” Lang said. “Johnnie was into conditioning. Some days we wouldn’t even touch a basketball. We’d just run up and down the hill behind the gym. That’s the type of player I was and that’s how I coach.”
But the players he has coached over the years say he’s a great coach in and of himself. The coaching tree that he’s created backs up their perspectives.
Rick Davis, the 1990 All-Big Bend Player of the Year for FAMU High, later coached the Rattlers after Lang and is now Leon’s head coach.
Anthony Robinson won two state titles under Lang, played four years of baseball at Florida A&M and is now an assistant baseball coach for the university.
Kendall Randolph is the head basketball coach at Cobb Middle. Cornell Thomas has been an assistant coach for FAMU DRS and Maclay.
Albert Arnold is the Dean of Students at Oak Ridge Elementary and has coached Godby’s junior varsity team.
Avery Curry is an assistant basketball coach at Rickards. And Lang also coached former NFL players Earl Holmes and Sam Madison, who have each coached on various levels and been involved with youth sports.
That’s Lang’s greatest legacy – the players he impacted that have gone on to become great community men in their own right.
“He’s very humble and likable,” Robinson said. “People saw the tough guy, who protected us, who fought for us. Even after we finished playing, he’d call us. He’d have us over for a cookout. He’s a father figure to most. He’s a friend, now. He’s a person that was never in the coaching business for accolades.
“He was there to change young men’s lives and help them develop into great citizens. His hard work and his effort shows in all the lives of guys that are so successful today.”
Besides Lang’s direct historical success on FAMU DRS, Rickards’ and Godby’s basketball programs may have Lang to thank indirectly for their recent state championships. Nims feeds into Rickards and Griffin into Godby.
“We probably won the championship at Nims every year I was there,” Lang said. “And I’m going on my 10th year at Griffin and we had back-to-back undefeated seasons recently. I’m glad to see that the kids that I’ve coached have done well.”
Lang has three more years before he’ll retire. But because he’s been so entrenched in community work and creating foundational success for youths, he’ll never fully slide away from doing what he loves.
It’s in his blood.
“I’ve never cared about records,” Lang said. “My job is to make sure I develop these kids into being better men.”
Ron Lang’s players, in their words
Kendall Randolph, Cobb Middle head basketball coach
“My favorite memory was sophomore year when at 5-foot-9 went up to contest a dunk. I swiped the ball, dislocated my pinky finger and completely lost any tough guy in me. I went over to Coach Lang quivering. I showed him the finger and without hesitation he grabbed the crooked finger and realigned it. Before I knew it he taped my pinky and ring fingers together. Then looked my dead in my eye and said, ‘You got nine more good fingers, Redd, now go out there and check No. 20, he’s killing us!’
“I later asked him why he acted so nonchalant when I first showed it to him and I acted like I was dying. Exactly, he explained, he said that I was already so worked up, scared, voice trembling, and looking like I was about to cry, that if he had reacted in a similar manner I would’ve lost it for sure ‘Man, you probably would’ve fainted,’ he said laughingly. That was just typical Coach Lang. It was just another of the many ways he showed us tough love while caring at the same time.”
Rick Davis, Leon High head basketball coach
“He had a personal relationship with all his players and that translated onto the court. At the end of the day, we knew he cared about us and wanted us to succeed. He made us better players and better people because we are able to talk to him about anything. Outside of basketball, we could go to him with anything. On the court, he demanded you play hard.”
Cornell Thomas, former Rickards player and assistant coach at FAMU DRS and Maclay
“I grew up very shy in school. The way he coached us, he taught me how to stand up for myself and not be in the back of the crowd. He taught me how to assert myself in games. I took that on after Rickards and went to the Army. In the military, I was selected as platoon leader because of the confidence I had in myself. It wouldn’t have been that way if Lang hadn’t pulled that out of me in playing sports. I became a leader because of him.”
Avery Curry, former Nims player and current assistant coach at Rickards
“He was real big on academics, being that a lot of kids that went to Nims came from low-income areas. He prepared everybody academically more than basketball. Basketball was secondary to him. He wanted to build you up as a man. It’s something we took away at a young age more than just basketball. He got in your face in the classroom more than on the court. He was a really big presence at Nims and it was very important for a lot of us guys.”
