Justin Bryant always was among the spectators at Grundy County High School basketball games the past few years.
This season, his seat will be a lot closer.
Bryant recently was hired as boys' basketball coach for the Yellow Jackets - his first head coaching job at any level. A 2004 Grundy graduate, he was an all-state quarterback in football and a four-year starter in basketball.
"I didn't get nearly as much recognition on the basketball team because we weren't that good," he said. "I know that I'm more well-known on the football field, but I like the thought of coaching basketball. This opportunity arose and I took."
The Yellow Jackets finished fourth in District 7-AA in 2010-11 and took third in the district tournament before falling 79-59 to DeKalb County in the Region 4-AA quarterfinals. Senior Blake Stephens, an all-area first-team selection, leads a solid nucleus coming back, but Bryant's vision is pointed more toward future seasons than this one.
"I have to come in and start building a more stable program to where we become competitive every single year," he said. "I don't want to just have a good team; I want a good program to where our players know how things are going to be and we can be competitive year in and year out."
He said that with a shorter lineup, he will run more of an up-tempo offense while showing some variation on the defensive end.
"I'm just going to have to sit down and evaluate the talent level that we have here," he said. "We're going to be a lot different than we've been in past years, so we're going to have to try a lot of different things."