West Charlotte names alum Steve Joyner Jr. as athletic director

When Steve Joyner Jr. was growing up, he would often go to West Charlotte High boys basketball games, helping to pack the school’s tiny gym.

Watching all-time Lions greats like Junior Burrough and Thad Bonapart, each former Observer players of the year, play in front of sold-out crowds, Joyner quickly knew where he wanted to play in high school.

“I just wanted to part of that,” he said Wednesday afternoon. “Pretty early on in my life, I decided I wanted to go to West Charlotte.”

Now, 43, Joyner is going back.

He will officially start as the new athletic director at West Charlotte in March, replacing longtime Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools employee John Yewcic, who is retiring after 35 years in education, including 25 in CMS.

Joyner, who started work at the school Monday, will report to new Lions principal Orlando Robinson, who is in his first year.

“When I took this job, I kind of thought it would be the same feeling (I had as a student),” Joyner said, “but it’s a different feeling, being that we’re in a new building with a completely different set up from when I went to school.”

Joyner — the son of legendary Johnson C. Smith coach Steve Joyner Sr. — played three years at West Charlotte before he graduated in 1997.

After high school, he played for his father at Smith, where he was the Golden Bulls’ starting point guard on the 2001 team that won the school’s first CIAA Tournament title and reached the quarterfinals of the NCAA Division II national tournament.

And when the younger Joyner graduated, he quickly got into coaching, working with his late uncle, Ed, who was head coach at Livingstone College, which is, like Smith, a Division II HBCU. Livingstone is located in Salisbury.

Joyner also had assistant coaching stops at North Carolina Central, UNC-Asheville and Florida A&M. He got his first head coaching job with Winston-Salem State’s women in 2010, and came home to coach the Smith women in 2012.

Joyner stayed at Smith until he resigned early in the 2022-23 season when the team was 0-3.

Overall, Joyner was 147-102 at Smith with a 2017 CIAA tournament title. In a statement to The Charlotte Post last year, Smith spokesperson Sherri Belfield would not discuss the reasons why he left.

“We respect Mr. Steve Joyner Jr.’s decision,” Belfield told the Post, “and, just like any organization, we are not at liberty to discuss personnel matters or the personal decisions of our employees.”

Dante Travis was named interim coach and the Golden Bulls’ women are 7-10 heading into Thursday’s game at Winston-Salem State.

Asked why he stepped down, Joyner said Wednesday that “it was just time to move away.”

“I’ve got nothing bad to say about Johnson C. Smith,” he said. “Just like all places and all people, we have things we need to work on, and I felt it was time for me to step away and move in another direction, whether that was coaching or getting into the administrative side. This was something that’s been on my mind.

“Being in coaching, they say they’re only two types of people: the ones who get fired and the ones about to be fired. You always have to have a Plan B ready, and when this job got posted (for West Charlotte), I kind of felt it was God knocking at the door saying, ‘Son this something you need to take.’”

Joyner believes he’s heading back to his high school alma mater at an opportune time. The Lions have just opened a new school building. There’s also a new principal and community development around the school is beginning to expand.

“I think it is the right time,” he said. “We’ve got a new school, new principal, new AD and the community is changing and growing with everything that’s going on. It’s a great time to reconnect with the city and reach back out to our alumni. We probably have the best alumni base in Charlotte and maybe the state.”

Joyner said his plan — and his vision for his new school — is simple.

“We want to get (alumni) back engaged,” he said. “We want to give the coaches the support they need so they can grow their programs and give student-athletes a chance to be successful by teaching life lessons through sports — and ultimately we want to change the stigma hovering over the school and bring back ‘The Roar’ of West Charlotte.”

Like it used to be when he was a kid.

This story was originally published January 24, 2023 at 5:12 PM.