Fleming latest to get shot at rebuilding South

FLORENCE — One snap at a time, one play at a time.
That’s how Lynn Fleming hopes to rebuild the South Florence football program.
The first-year Bruins coach inherits a team that has a combined seven wins in its last three seasons and is under its third different coaching regime as well.

“You want to see that light, but right now we’re deep in the tunnel,” Fleming said. “The only thing we can do is work our way out of it.
“And that’s pretty much our philosophy. We want to build on every game, every practice and every snap.”

So far, it seems the message has gotten through.

“We all went to a (Fellowship of Christian Athletes) camp in Spartanburg,” senior quarterback Troy Jones said. “After that, we tried to take what we learned there and apply it on the field.
“It’s about teamwork. It’s about no negativity, no personal agendas and just going out and working hard every day.”

“We’re not looking back,” Fleming said. “We’re pressing forward and trying to instill some confidence in these kids and mainly help them put a few wins under their belts.”

A little bit of everything
But the Bruins won’t be letting go of the past completely.
In order to help ease the transition, Fleming is incorporating some of what Brian Lane did, some of what Ken Cribb did and even some of what Mike Watts did.
And not just at the high school level, but rather in every program as building blocks for the future.

“A lot of it is really not as different as you’d think,” Fleming said. “A lot of the terminology is the same and the offense and defenses are a lot of the same things they’ve done over the past couple of years.
“You try to keep things as much the same as you can. I think that can only help the kids.”

“We thought it was going to be a completely different offense for the third straight year,” senior offensive lineman Dustin Revell said. “But coach Fleming kept things pretty much the same. We just run the ball a little more now than we did last year.
“So far, the offense and defense seem to be running smoothly.”

Having a former offensive coordinator back to lead the team made the transition a little easier, Jones and Revell said.

And once the football season began, everything began to take shape, Fleming said.

“Once the season starts, I think all of that other stuff kind of fades away and the kids just concentrate on football.”

Pressing forward
Bringing the Bruins back into to contention will be a process, Fleming said, but he believes the right steps have been taken thus far.

“One of our main goals was to get the kids back in the weight room and get them back on a kind of a regular routine,” Fleming said. “With these last two years, they’ve kind of missed out on a few sessions here and there and it’s important to get back to doing the routine things well.”

That’s not to say it won’t be an ongoing process, though.

“Coming in, I knew what the situation was,” Fleming said. “I think my first go-round here we were real close to winning nine ballgames, losing three games by about five points. That’s something that a program can feed off of. We’re trying to get back to that point.

“Winning is the biggest thing. We want to put the kids in a position to be competitive and to have the opportunity to win some games. But I know it’s going to take time. Some things we should see an immediate impact, others might take years.”

“All you can do is work hard, have faith and believe that you can do it,” Jones said.