Earl Vaughan Jr.
BY EARL VAUGHAN JR. | CityView Sports Columnist
Three former football standouts and a pair of local basketball legends head the class of 2024 inductees for the Fayetteville Sports Club Hall of Fame.
The site and date of this year’s Hall of Fame ceremony are yet to be determined, according to Sports Club president Greg Parks. Details on the banquet along with ticket information will be announced at a later date.
Once the date and location are announced tickets can be obtained by calling Ashley Petroski at 910-323-9195 or emailing her at
ashley@npfp.com.
Here is a capsule biography of each inductee:
Brent Barker
Barker was the women’s basketball coach at South View High School from 1994-2021, the longest tenure of any women’s coach in school history.
He compiled a record of 557-166, making the NCHSAA playoffs 27 times. His 2006-07 team went 32-0 and won the NCHSAA 4-A championship.
Barker’s Tigers were led by Amber Calvin and Samantha Ramirez. Calvin led the unbeaten Tigers in scoring with 18.4 points per game while Ramirez averaged 17.1. Ramirez was the team’s top 3-point shooter, hitting 65 for the season. Calvin connected on 44.
Nine other times under Barker the Tigers made either the Sweet 16, quarterfinals or final four in the state.
Aaron Curry
Curry is one of the most honored football players in the history of E.E. Smith High School.
While at Smith he earned all-conference and all-region, playing in the annual Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas at the end of his prep career.
He was an All-American at Wake Forest and won the prestigious Butkus Award as the nation’s best linebacker.
He was the fourth player taken overall in the 2009 NFL draft. He spent four seasons in the NFL with the Seattle Seahawks, Oakland Raiders and the New York Giants.
After leaving pro football he coached with the Charlotte 49ers at the college level, then the Seattle Seahawks, and is currently the inside linebackers coach with the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Marques Murrell
Murrell was a standout defender for Jack Britt, recording 21 sacks in his final two seasons for the Buccaneers. He was named All-Region.
He went on to play at Appalachian State, helping lead the Mountaineers to a pair of NCAA Divison I-AA national titles in 2005 and 2006.
He forced a fumble returned by E.E. Smith’s Jason Hunter for the winning score in a 21-16 victory over Northern Iowa.
Murrell signed with the Philadelphia Eagles as an undrafted free agent in 2007. He also played for the New England Patriots and in the Canadian Football League with Montreal.
Tammy Brown Tew
Tew was one of the top basketball players in a long list of stars at Terry Sanford High School. She finished her 1984-87 career with 2,644 points. Her best scoring average for a season was 18.1.
She went on to more stardom at Campbell University. Thirty years after graduating in 1991 she remained the school’s all-time leading scorer with 1,893 points. She was named the school’s outstanding female as a junior and senior.
The Big South Conference honored her as its women’s basketball player of the year in 1990 and 1991. She was twice named All-American by the American Women’s Sports Federation.
She was also a three-time All-Big South choice. In 1989 Tew led the Camels to the Big South Championship. She set a conference all-time scoring record in her senior year and hit double figures in the final 65 games of her career.
Ray Williams
Williams was an electrifying high school football player at Reid Ross High School under the coaching of fellow Hall of Famer John Daskal.
In 1981, Williams led the Cougars to the state’s first NCHSAA Division II football title with a 21-7 win over High Point Central.
A football and baseball star coming out of Reid Ross, Williams enrolled at Clemson where he was a star in both sports for the Tigers. He turned down an offer to play at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill because the Tar Heels wouldn’t allow him to play football and baseball.
After a red-shirt season, Williams became a starter in both football and baseball for the Tigers. In football, he became one of only six Tigers with at least 1,000 yards receiving and 1,000 yards in kickoff returns.
In baseball, Williams is one of only two Clemson players with at least 30 home runs and 70 stolen bases. He had brief stints in Major League Baseball and the NFL, playing for the Seattle Mariners and Cleveland Browns.
Williams died from complications of diabetes last July after receiving a liver transplant in 2016. Four years before his death he created a foundation encouraging people to donate organs. The website is
www.registerme.org/campaign/raywilliams.
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