Pleasant Home Principal Craig Nichols said Thursday that he hopes to fill the vacant boys basketball and girls softball coaching positions by July 8.

The target date is the next regularly-scheduled Covington County Board of Education meeting.

Last week, Bradley Stephens — who coached boys basketball and softball at PHS — accepted a position as Enterprise’s new head softball coach, thus leaving open the two positions at the 1A school.

Nichols said he’s interviewed several “excellent candidates” and has some promising leads, and added that applications coming in to the school are based on teacher need.

“It can come for several different places,” Nichols said about the applications. “For physical education (PE), I’ve been reviewing applications and some of them are new graduates who have never coached softball. With that being said, I have some leads on people and I have interviewed some strong possibilities.”

The interview process, Nichols said, has been non-stop.

“If you count PE, social studies and math, I’d say I’ve had about 15-20 interviews,” he said. “We’ve been looking. You’ve got to interview for slots to see if you can get great coaches out of that.”

Stephens stepped into Pleasant Home’s boys basketball slot after Jerry Davis took over the girls basketball team when Kelley Garner stepped down for maternity leave.

When asked whether he’s had anybody inside the school show any interest in both jobs, Nichols said he’s had some conversations with coaches.

“We’ve been looking for the best solution to make things best for our athletic situation,” he said. “I have talked to them, and we’re still working hard to find great people to fill these spots.”

In other coaching news, Florala still has yet to fill its vacant position left open for baseball.

FHS Principal Brent Zessin said the school is still in “limbo” on finding another coach for that role.

“We might have to do it in house,” Zessin said. “We’re looking for a high school special (education) teacher. We might just name somebody in house here.”

Like Nichols, Zessin said he hopes to have the position filled by the first of July or during the All-Star SportsWeek, which is July 21-25.