BROOKLET — For all the pitfalls on the gridiron for the Bulloch County schools last fall, it deserves to be remembered that one GHSA team did make the state playoffs.
    For Southeast Bulloch, 2016 was a season that fell below expectations. Preseason, the Yellow Jackets were the favorites to win their division after realignment shuffled away some of their best competition like Appling County and Pierce County.
    SEB had beaten Jenkins and Savannah in 2015 by double-digits, making it seem like the new Region 3-AAA was the Yellow Jackets' for the taking. However, breaking in nine new starters on defense was something head coach Pat Collins didn’t anticipate taking such a toll on SEB in some of their bigger games.
    “It’s true we set some team goals that weren’t met and I was certainly disappointed in that,” Collins said. “I don’t think any less of those guys last year and their efforts, but we did fall short of our goal to host and win a state playoff game.”
    Collins will readily admit he purposely scheduled his out of conference teams tough to counterbalance the beatings they’d dole out to the Beach’s and the Johnson’s of their region. So the losses to Class AAAAAA Richmond Hill and Class AA state champions Benedictine were to be expected — even the seven-point defeat to Jenkins wasn't a huge shock due to the close contests the Warriors and SEB had in the past.
    But the 33-16 loss to an upstart Savannah team at Fred Shaver Field was perhaps the biggest surprise for SEB. The team would go on to reel off three straight, double-digit wins before being upended in the first round of the playoffs by Worth County, suffering a 35-7 beating. And with the stately Jack Webb moving into retirement from his defensive coordinator post, Collins knew he had to keep an experienced presence at defensive coordinator for a defense that gave up 30-plus points in all five of their losses.
    “I didn’t ask him straight up, but just planted the idea that we’d like to have him,” Collins said. “I invited him out to our weight program and I think after he saw what the kids were putting in it helped make up his mind. In a way I planted it and the kids sold it.”
    The “him” Collins was referring to was Steve Pennington — yes, that Steve Pennington. The former Statesboro head football coach who saw his outstanding career as a Blue Devil come to an end last fall. Pennington had the big retirement party, honors thrown his way and all — but as former NBA Champion head coach Pat Riley would say,
    “Competition is a sickness, you can try and walk away from it all you want but in the end you’ll always be pulled back in. You’re constantly telling yourself you can always win one more.”
    However Pennington doesn’t consider his “unretirement” a sickness, but rather a way to pursue what he calls a “hobby”. The former state champion head coach still thinks he can help mentor young men, which in his words has always been the most important part of being a coach.
    “I’ve always used coaching as a way to witness to others,” Pennington said. “I’m looking forward to building new relationships here at SEB like I did at all of my other stops. I’m just grateful Pat gave me this opprotunity so I could keep living this out.”
    What can get lost about Pennington from the on-field aspect of his job is that, for more than a decade, he was one of Georgia’s finest defensive minds — and could still very well have those same wits about him. From 1999 to 2013 — both as a defensive coordinator and a head coach — Statesboro allowed an absurdly low 11.6 ppg. The same intensity that won Statesboro two state championships and took them to another three title games is what Collins hopes can inspire another generation of Yellow Jacket defenders.
    “We’re very fortunate that we get to replace someone like Jack Webb with Steve Pennington,” Collins said. “He’s going to be very hands on and is going to help our kids on that side of the ball right away.”
    Defensive improvement — and improvement in all aspects of the game — is one of the major goals of this year’s spring campaign in Brooklet. Once again SEB will have to replace a number of key starters like Antonio Roberts and Jonathan Volskay.
    That’s not to say SEB doesn’t have big spots to fill on offense — mainly quarterback and a couple of spots on the offensive line. But with Region 3-AAA offensive player of the year Chase Walker coming back and fellow all-region performer Jontrell Wells, the offense at least has two bell cows they can hitch their wagon to.
    As far as the defense is concerned, they’ll still be looking for bodies to compliment the experienced defenders SEB will have back like Brandon Breda and Slade Burgin. While no one has stood out yet — being as Monday was SEB’s first spring practice in two years and two weeks remain before their spring scrimmage against Portal on May 19 — Pennington will be looking diligently for someone who can match the intensity of the defense he wants to run.
    “I want kids who possess high football intelligence and are aggressive,” Pennington said. “That’s what we’ll be looking for as we move along in this process.”