Bill Castle beats out 11 others for the FHSAA's top coach of the past 100 years.

Bill Castle followed his mentor Paul Quinn as an assistant from Lake City Columbia to Lakeland in 1971. Little did he know what was in store. Thirty-six years laters, 32 as Quinn's successor as head coach, Castle is one of the most successful high school football coaches in Florida history, and his success was honored Friday night.

Lakeland coach Bill Castle addresses the crowd at halftime of Friday's Class 5A state championship game after being recognized as the state's top coach of the past century. PHOTO COURTESY OF THE ORLANDO SENTINEL

CASTLE'S NUMBERS RECORD: 308-74 STATE TITLES: Six ('86, '96, '99, '04-'06) LONGEST WIN STREAK: Regular season - 60 (1996-01); Overall - 53 (2004-07)

Castle was named the FHSAA's Coach of the Century during halftime of the Class 5A championship game between two teams that have had to deal with the results of Castle's coaching success - Fort Lauderdale St. Thomas Aquinas and Kissimmee Osceola.

"It's a tremendous honor,'' Castle said. "What can you say? When you talk about all the great coaches that Florida has had and the respect for the state of Florida for high school football, it's an overwhelming honor. There's a lot of coaches out there who deserved that award.''

The award came as a suprise to Castle, who didn't know he won until it was announced during the halftime ceremony.

"I didn't have a clue,'' said Castle, whose career record is 308-74.

Castle took over at Lakeland when Quinn went to Bartow in 1976. The Dreadnaughts won their first state title in 1986 but went nine seasons without a return to the state championship.

From 1996 through 2006, however, Lakeland won five state titles, including three in a row from 2004-06, to give the Dreadnaughts six under Castle.

Castle also led Lakeland to two record winning streaks. Lakeland won 60 consecutive regular season games from 1996 to 2001 for the first record. The Dreadnaughts then won 53 games in a row from 2004 to 2007 to break Lake Butler Union County's record of 52 games. That streak came to an end when Osceola defeated Lakeland, 25-21.

"If he was going to break it, I wished he really would have broken it and put 10 or 15 games on it,'' fellow nominee Robby Pruitt said. "But I'm happy for him.''

Pruitt was one of the 12 coaches selected to the All-Century coaching staff. St. Thomas Aquinas coach George Smith also was among the 12 coaches.

"He was the first to really congratulate me,'' Castle said. "To come over like that, it shows a lot of class.''

The other coaches whom Castle beat out for the award were Gene Cox, Walt Frazier, Joe Kinnan, Nick Kotys, Carl Madison, Gerald Odom, Nathaniel ''Traz'' Powell, Corky Rogers and Al Werneke.