Former White Hall athletic director Sam Smith and Monticello game official Gary Lucas will join former Watson Chapel girls basketball coach Leslie Henderson in the Arkansas Activities Association halls of fame.
The three will be honored at a banquet Friday night at Horner Hall inside the Hot Springs Convention Center. Tickets are no longer being sold.
The banquet will welcome three new members of the Arkansas High School Athletic Administrators Association hall, including Smith; six new members of the Arkansas Officials Association hall, including Lucas; and six new members of the Arkansas High School Coaches Association hall, including Henderson.
Smith, a native of Gillett, served in the White Hall School District from 1968-2011 as math teacher, assistant and head football coach (the latter for 15 years), head baseball coach, assistant principal, principal and assistant superintendent for transportation and athletics. His 1980 White Hall baseball team won a state championship, and in the 1996-97 school year he was honored as Arkansas Assistant Principal of the Year.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
Smith led several major facility upgrades including turfing of the football field, construction of a new track and an additional gymnasium and softball field. He was appointed athletic director in 1996.
According to his bio, Smith “believes strongly in the life lessons gained through athletic competition, which he considers one of the most rewarding aspects of his career.” Married with three children and two grandchildren, Smith is an active member of White Hall United Methodist Church and also inducted into the White Hall Athletic Hall of Fame.
Lucas serves as information technology director at the University of Arkansas at Monticello College of Technology McGehee. He is credited with advancing the college’s technological capabilities and fostering a culture of innovation.
Lucas began officiating in 1988 with pee wee basketball. He has also officiated high school and college basketball, football and volleyball, and he has assigned officials. He founded the Southeast Arkansas Referee Camp in 2006, where he actively teaches and recruits new officials.
Lucas has been on the board of the Arkansas Officials Association since 2020, on the Drew Central School District board since 2018 and its president since 2021. He also coached an AAU travel basketball team for more than six years.
Lucas is married to Margaret and a member of Sixteen Section Missionary Baptist Church.
Henderson’s upcoming induction into the AHSCA hall was announced in December. She has since been hired as girls basketball coach at Viola, located east of her childhood home of Mountain Home.
The Lady Wildcats’ varsity head coach from 1989-2024, Henderson won 593 games and five state championships during the 2000s and 2010s. Her track and field teams also won five state championships.
