The man who built Covington Catholic into a football powerhouse is headed to the Dawahares/KHSAA Hall of Fame.
Lynn Ray is among the inductees for the 2026 class to be inducted Sunday, April 26, at the Central Bank Center Ballroom in Lexington.Â
Ray began his coaching tenure at Covington Catholic in 1975 as a program still somewhat in its infancy, having won 34 games since they started up the program in 1966. After being an assistant at Bryan Station, Lloyd Memorial and CovCath, Ray took over the reigns at 28 years old. His first season at the helm the team had just 27 players. It took a little bit, but once the Colonels got going, they were a machine starting in the late 1980’s. Ray would win 234 games in a 30-year run, during which Covington Catholic became not only a state title contender but also won a pair of back-to-back Class 3A state championships in 1987 and ’88, again in 1993 and ’94, with his final title in 1997. Ray’s long list of accolades on top of being the winningest coach in program history were being selected to coach the Commonwealth All-Stars in the 1990 Kentucky-Tennessee All-Star game, was named the 1992 Coach of the Year in Kentucky by the Courier-Journal, and was among the coaches who first organized the Kentucky Football Coaches Association in 1993. Ray went 5-0 in state title games and won over 60% of his games for a program at the time had no practice field and no stadium.
Ray retired after the 2004 season.
As a player, Ray was a three-sport athlete in football, basketball and baseball at Boone County. He earned 1962 All-State Honorable Mention at running back and was voted the school’s overall Most Valuable Athlete for all sports in 1962 and ’63. He earned a football scholarship and played football at Eastern Kentucky under Roy Kidd, graduating in 1968.
Ray is part of a 13-member class.
Others to be inducted include: Makayla Epps (Athlete / Marion County), Gwen Doyle Howard (Athlete / duPont Manual), James Haire (Coach / Elizabethtown), Jody Hamilton (Coach / Raceland, Boyd County, West Jessamine, Owensboro Catholic), Chuck Medley (Coach / Saint Xavier), Joe Morris (Coach / Mayfield), Glenn Napier (Athlete / MC Napier), Larry Pursiful (Athlete / Lone Jack/Bell County), Riherd Family (Contributor/Riherds Sport Shop, Riherds.Com, KHSAA/Riherds Scoreboard), Bill Mike Runyon (Coach / Paintsville), Emma Talley (Athlete / Caldwell County) and Curtis Turley (Coach / Warren Central, Greenwood, Henderson County, Daviess County).
With the introduction of this year’s 13-member class, the Dawahares/KHSAA Hall of Fame has grown to 542 all-time members since its inception in 1988. Tickets to the Induction Ceremony will be available for purchase at a later date on khsaatickets.org.