The Apex Cougar Club is excited to announce this year’s Apex High School/Apex Consolidated 2020 Hall of Fame Inductees:
Cawley bromley
Donny Cobb
WES DURHAM
TJ Evans
Stewart Hill
DEL PHILLIPS
CAWLEY BROMLEY
CLASS OF 2011
Cawley Bromley is a 2011 graduate of Apex High School. The Bromley family is often known as the “First family of Apex Women’s Lacrosse” due to the fact that Cawley’s father, Rob, was integral in getting women’s lacrosse started in the Apex area, and he also served as an assistant coach at the high school where Cawley and her two sisters both played. Therefore, it is fitting that she is the first women’s lacrosse athlete in the Apex High School/Apex Consolidated Hall of Fame.
Bromley graduated from Apex High School as a three-time State Champion and two-time State Championship game MVP. Furthermore, Bromley was selected as a two-time winner of the News and Observer Lacrosse Player of the year and two-time conference player of the year. Cawley’s remarkable accomplishments have stood the test of time as she is still our school’s all-time points leader with 334 points and the all-time playoffs scoring leader as well. On top of this, Bromley was named all-conference for all four years of her Apex career. In recognition for her accomplishments, she was also named to the North Carolina Women’s Lacrosse All-Decade Team.
A testament to Bromley’s dominance is that during her four years, the Apex Cougar Women’s Lacrosse team had a record of 69-3 against NC schools and two of those losses came when Bromley was unable to play due to a torn ACL. After graduating from Apex, Cawley went to Virginia Tech and played there for four years. She earned Academic All-Conference Honors at VT in 2014. Following her playing career, she was an assistant Coach at Campbell University. Today, she continues to share her passion for lacrosse in Chicago where she currently works and coaches in youth programs. Despite Cawley’s stunning accomplishments on the field, she is best remembered for being humble, hard-working and a great teammate.
Donny Cobb
CLASS OF 1970
Donny Cobb is a graduate of the Class of 1970, the last graduating class of Apex Consolidated High School. Cobb was a member of the track team (shot put), but he is most noted for his performance as a basketball player. During his senior year, Donny averaged 25 points per game and broke the previous school record for the most points scored during a single game by scoring 42 points. Donnie was a leader and was selected as co-captain of the basketball team, a title he shared with Marvin Howard. Other varsity basketball accomplishments include: All Conference/All-Tournament Wake-Johnston County, ACHS Team Most Valuable Player.
After this rewarding high school experience, Donny continued his education by attending Holding Tech Community College (now Wake Tech Community College) and studied HVAC. From there, Donny began a very successful 47-year career at Newcomb and Company. While at Newcomb, Donny became the first African American supervisor and manager. Donny also traveled the country to further develop his skilled trade and to also use his knowledge of the field to help others through his instruction.
Throughout the years, Donny has remained family oriented. He has made it his purpose to not only teach his family about hard work, but also to demonstrate it. Donny becomes the second member of his family to enter the Apex High/Apex Consolidated Hall of Fame as his sister, Lisa Cobb Leslie, was inducted in 2016. His family not only includes his immediate family, but also his church family. Donnie has remained active in his church, St. Mary’s Free Will Baptist Church, where he has served on the Deacon Board for over 25 years.
Since retiring in 2018, Donny has enjoyed spending time focusing on his family and his grandchildren. Through the lessons instilled in him through his upbringing from the faculty at Apex Consolidated High School, Donnie gleaned so much that contributed to his success in life. In reflecting on everyone who sowed knowledge, experience and wisdom into his life, Donny will always cherish this and is forever thankful.
Wes Durham
CLASS OF 1984
Wes Durham is a 1984 graduate of Apex High School. While at Apex High School, Wes was a two-year varsity letter winner in basketball while also participating in JV basketball and JV football. As an avid sports fan, Wes was also the Sports Editor for The Epilogue, which is our school’s yearbook. While at Apex, Wes also served as a public address announcer for the boy’s soccer team and the baseball team as well. Wes got his passion for sports announcing honestly as his late father, Woody Durham, is one of the most decorated announcers of all-time and served for forty-years as the “Voice of the Tar Heels” for the University of North Carolina football and basketball programs.
The support Wes received from friends and teachers was important, but the announcing experience that he gained at Apex High School helped spark a lifelong career. After graduating from Apex, Wes attended Elon and was on the air for 150 football and basketball games. After graduating in 1988, he worked first at Redford University, then for a year at Marshall University. He was hired in 1992, to broadcast Vanderbilt football and basketball. In Nashville, he also worked for the legendary WSM-AM for a year, where he won a pair of AP Awards for “Best Sports Report” and “Best Play-by-Play.”
In the fall of 1995, Wes was hired by Georgia Tech to be the university’s new radio voice. Beginning with the 2004 NFL season, Durham also took on the radio play-by-play duties for the Atlanta Falcons in addition to his responsibilities at Georgia Tech, becoming one of the very few to broadcast major college football and the NFL simultaneously. In 2005, he was honored by the Atlanta Sports Council with the Furman Bisher Award for sports media excellence in the Atlanta market.
In 2013, after 18 years and nearly 800 football and basketball broadcasts with Georgia Tech, Durham made the move to television as the lead broadcaster for ACC football, basketball and baseball games on Fox Sports South and Raycom Sports. In the winter of 2018, Durham began a partnership with Mark Packer, first on radio with SiriusXM and now with the ACC Network/ESPN. Packer and Durham is a daily show highlighting personalities and stories from within the conference.
Durham continues to broadcast ACC football and basketball for the ACC Network, in addition to his Falcons games in the fall. He has been recognized as being one of the best in the business and was a 2015 inductee into the Georgia Tech Sports Hall of Fame. Eleven times he has been named the “Georgia Sportscaster of the Year” by the National Sports Media Association, and was honored by the Elon University School of Communications as their “Distinguished Alumnus” in April of 2013.
Wes Durham has often used his platforms to promote Apex High School whether it is mentioning the Apex Cougars when on local sports radio stations or giving back to the Apex High Community. Today, the students who are selected as the best in the Apex High School Communications classes receive “The Durham Family Award for Journalism” thanks to Wes Durham’s impact at Apex and as an ambassador for our school, as he continues his broadcasting career. Durham lives in Cartersville, Georgia, with his wife, Victoria, and has twins, Emily and Will.
TJ Evans
CLASS OF 2014
TJ Evans was a 2014 graduate of Apex High School and he had a truly remarkable basketball career. He led his Apex teams to three straight regular season conference titles, each of those years leading the team in scoring while also being named a three-time “Conference Player of the Year.” His sophomore season, which was his first on varsity, he averaged 20 points per game and his team finished with a 26-4 record—one of the best in school history, if not the best. He also led the team to the 2012 Conference Tournament Championship that year after beating Green Hope in the finals at Green Hope.
During his senior year, he averaged 19 points per game and led the Cougars to the 2014 4A State Championship! Along the way, he was named East Regional MVP, where the Cougars took down Clayton in the first game and Millbrook in the East Regional Final the very next night at Crown Coliseum in Fayetteville. His performances in Fayetteville were legendary, going 17-17 from the free throw line in those two games, both of which were tightly contested and went down to the wire. TJ hit a shot at the end of the game to force overtime against Clayton, and he simply took over the game late versus Millbrook to put the Cougars into the State Championship game against Lake Norman in historic Reynolds Coliseum. In the 4A State Title game, TJ scored 23 points and was named the Most Outstanding Player for Apex as we won our first and only state championship in men’s basketball.
TJ scored 1,775 points in his Apex career. At the time, that was the most points scored by a player in school history. He finished his career with a 68-21 record. TJ always wanted to take the last shot of every game if it was needed. On his senior night in front of a packed Cougar Den facing a very good Panther Creek team, he rebounded a missed free throw by one of his teammates and put the ball in off the glass to cap off an incredible 15-0 run to win the game by one point.
Beyond his many basketball accomplishments, TJ is described by his coach as a wonderful person who cares for his family and especially his two younger brothers. What is important to remember about TJ is that while his talent is remarkable, his work ethic is second to none.
Stewart hill
CLASS OF 1978
Stewart Hill is a 1978 graduate of Apex High School and a U.S. Navy veteran. During Stewart’s four years at Apex High, he lettered a total of nine times. He lettered all four years in varsity baseball, three years in varsity football, two years in basketball and during the 1977-78 school year, he was named as a first team all-conference linebacker. He was an honorable mention for the All East in Football. Stewart’s football coach, Bobby Poss, says of Hill, “Stewart was truly an outstanding athlete and an all-conference linebacker. He was also our team’s second-leading receiver and he played on all special teams. He provided outstanding leadership on and off the field.” A natural leader, Stewart was the co-captain of both the football and baseball teams while he was at Apex. In baseball Stewart was a left-handed power hitter with an incredible batting average. In basketball, Stewart was a two-year starter at power forward.
Stewart’s commitment and dedication did not end at Apex High School. He went on to coach Pop Warner football and youth baseball in Apex for many years. He attends Good Hope Baptist Church and has been a participating member for 48 years. Stewart became a founding member of the Bass Master’s Society of Chatham County and he supported the Ruritans. Furthermore, he was a junior member of the Carpenter/Morrisville Fire Department.
An all-star athlete, Stewart continued to play sports and his softball teams won several state championships. To this day Stewart Hill is remembered by his classmates for his quiet, gentle, and committed spirit who always displayed sportsmanship and exemplary character and integrity on and off the field/court. He has been described by his friends as a “Five-star person!”
Del Phillips
COACH/ATHLETIC DIRECTOR 2005-2019
Del Phillips worked at Apex High School from 2005-2019. Coach Phillips was hired as the baseball coach at Apex High School in 2005 and coached baseball for three years. Out of those three years his teams were conference champions twice and he was recognized as Conference Coach of the Year for two of those years as well. Starting in 2005, Coach Phillips was able to generate over $150,000 worth of improvements to the baseball field and was the force behind dramatic enhancements to the field, the stadium and the lighting structures.
After coaching the baseball team for those three seasons, Coach Phillips transitioned to become the Athletic Director of Apex High School in 2007. During the 2009 year he obtained his qualification as a Certified Athletic Administrator (CAA) and became one of four with that certification in Wake County at that time.
Coach Phillips created the Apex High/Apex Consolidated Hall of Fame in 2016. Some other notable accomplishments during Coach Phillips’ tenure as the Apex High School Athletic Director include winning the State Wells Fargo Cup in 2014-2015 and winning the conference Wells Fargo Cup 6 out of his 13 years as Athletic director. Furthermore, the historic success of the teams under Coach Phillips’ tenure include 11 state championship teams and over 75 conference championships.
Coach Phillips’ impact not only included Apex High School, but the entire county as well. He was part of the WCPSS committee to increase wages for coaches, he served as the SWAC Conference President, and he created the Student/Athlete Ethics Contract that has been used at many area schools. A tireless worker, Coach Phillips is best known for being on his tractors and mowers and taking care of the Apex High School’s fields and facilities, and his fields were known to be some of the best, if not the best, in the state. Coach Phillips’ truck was often seen most Saturdays and Sundays at Apex High School while taking care of the fields.
Coach Phillips was instrumental in helping move to the temporary location at Green Level and while at the temporary location, he maintained the fields at both facilities while the facility at Laura Duncan Road was rebuilt. Coach Phillips would be the first to tell you that none of his or the school’s accomplishments could have ever happened without the great coaches, the Cougar Club, or the many parent volunteers who have helped out in some form or fashion. The motto Coach Phillips lives by was shared with him by his father and it goes like this: “No matter what you do, make it your best. It only takes 5 minutes longer to do the job the right way than the wrong way. Always … always spend that 5 minutes in all that you do.”