L.J. Hepp has been named as the new athletic director at Panther Creek High School, returning to a school where he had been a successful basketball coach, according to various media reports including the Raleigh News and Observer.

Hepp will replace Todd Schuler, who has taken the athletic director position at Cardinal Gibbons.

Hepp guided the Panther Creek basketball team to a 28-3 mark during the 2008-09 season, but then left the high school ranks to become the director of basketball operations at the University of South Carolina. He was there for a year before going overseas to serve as head coach of a professional basketball team in Japan.

A graduate of Leesville Road High School and the University of North Carolina, Hepp has also been on the basketball staffs at Stanford and Tulsa. He has been working in the Panther Creek alternative learning center.