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COACH WELLS GETS HIS “PROPS”
January 13th, 2008

It took a few years…….from the beginning of the SFA basketball program…the CYO part……….until now with three competitive teams in the BCL and the MIAA….and through it all there was Coach Wells.

At yesterday’s celebration of his 500th win last Sunday, there were the the “notables and the quotables” gathered from all around East Baltimore and elsewhere, paying homage to the “quiet man,” William Wells.  There were ex-players, Devin Gray, Mark Karcher, Corey Bradford, Alphonso Jones, Charles Beaufort, Kevin McClain and Eric Payton from the “old days.”  They all gave the same message when called on to speak…..how Coach Wells was a father figure and how important he was in their lives.  It wasn’t about basketball per se, but about influencing young men in the friendly confines of Madison Rec, where so many hours were spent in that band box of a gym…(I used to practice there with my girls…back in the day) and under the dome in the stifling heat of summer.

All the politicians were there….our own Councilman “Jack” Young, State Senator McFadden, Delegate Branch and speaking for the mayor was  Deputy Mayor Salima Siler Marriott.                                

All the kind words and the citations were for a man that has been and still is an institution in East Baltimore and around the city of Baltimore for so many years.

Sr. Rita Michelle Proctor, the first athletic director of SFA, presented him with an authentic picture of Mother Lange and it was fitting, since William Wells is a “son” of Mother Lange, carrying out her vision in the school she built.

Coach Wells has carried out his mission……to help young boys become men…for many a year now……..and "quiet as it’s kept" …..he is a jewel of East Baltimore.