By Ashley Hargrove
Stace Tedford paced up and down the gym floor at Athens High School Tuesday afternoon.
The first-year head coach even jogged the floor at times as he carefully watched his Golden Eagle basketball team scrimmage.
Since being hired as the head coach in June, Tedford has been anxiously awaiting basketball season. And by the intensity and hustle at practice, it’s obvious members of his team are just as anxious to get the new season underway.
“This is our third practice with our football players that have come in and we won’t be ready to play in our home opener against Columbia next Thursday, but I’m really excited about this team,” Tedford said. “I’ll be even more excited when everybody starts understanding what we’re doing.”
At first, Tedford was a little worried about how the players just now joining the team would catch on to things, but he says that hasn’t been a problem. The players who have been with Tedford since practice began in October have been filling them in.
“We’ve had 12 to work with while football was going on and they’ve really shown a lot of leadership,” Tedford said. “These guys coming in have done a great job as well. They came in eager and have shown lots of focus and concentration. It’s a challenge opening up with three games at home on four days of practice, but our goal is to compete and play as hard as we can and just hope something good comes out of that.”
Athens opens their season at home a week from Thursday against Columbia. The junior varsity boys kick-off the action at 4 p.m.
