By: Jason Bishop

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

Three years ago the Glynn County administration made the decision they wanted both Glynn Academy and Brunswick High to contend every year for state titles. Glynn Academy hired Rocky Hidalgo and that is what Glynn has become, a perennial state title contender.

Two years ago the Brunswick High Pirates made the playoffs and lost in the first round to the Stockbridge Tigers. The administration then made the decision to fire Victor Floyd, who was the BHS coach at the time. One of the reasons given for the decision to let Floyd go was his lack of success in the playoffs.

The Pirates then hired a young and upcoming coach from AA Macon County, Larry Harold. Harold had turned around the Macon County program and was coming off winning a region championship with the Bulldogs.

However, Harold never did duplicate the success he had at Macon County with the Pirates and had a losing record after two years. Larry Harold resigned at the end of this past season.

A search committee was formed to find the next Pirate coach, but not just any coach would do. Remember, the administration wanted both the Glynn and BHS programs to contend for state titles, so hiring the right coach would be paramount this time around.

The job opening received 32 applications from, not only Georgia, but from around the country. The search committee weeded through every application and created an interview list that only consisted of five candidates.

Those five candidates all had a ton of playoff success on their resume and resided over powerhouse programs.

The search committee wrapped up their interviews in a week and have offered the job to the Pierce County coach, Sean Pender; pending approval by the Glynn County Board of Education.

Pender is coming off taking the Bears to the Elite Eight this past season in AAA and has had a ton of success during his time at Pierce. When Pender took the job with the Bears the program was not nearly as respected as it is now under his guidance.

Pender will inherit a much deeper talent pool at Brunswick High than he ever had at Pierce. There is no coach in the state that has done more with less than Sean Pender.

He is an offensive specialist and will make the BHS offense fun to watch, especially with the athletes he will inherit. The Pirates will have 35 seniors return next season and will be positioned to make a deep playoff run with the talent returning.

Sean Pender spent eight seasons at Brantley County going 35-43 for the Blue Herons; one season at Crisp going 4-7 and five seasons at Pierce going 54-18.