Lenoir-Rhyne University junior Dewayne Jones is happy to have a chance to lead the Bears' defense this season.
A 6-foot-1, 225-pound linebacker, Jones played in a storied football program at Reidsville High, and he had high hopes of leaving his hometown and making a name for himself in football.
He's spent the last two seasons in Hickory, making 140 career tackles as one of L-R's defensive leaders, and is ready for his junior season to begin.
The Bears' first game is Saturday night at 7 p.m. against West Virginia Tech at Moretz Stadium.
"Reidsville is not a place where a lot of people get an opportunity to succeed," said Jones. "Some people go to jail or end up in the streets …
"I was the first person in my family to graduate high school so I felt accomplished. But I knew I had a long way to go."
Jones' first hope was to play football at N.C. State but that did not pan out. He eventually found his way to L-R after Allan Greber, a former L-R assistant coach, talked with his mother.
"I decided I wanted to put my stamp on their football program," Jones said.
He left a mark on head coach Jimmy Teague's program at Reidsville by making 285 tackles and making all-conference twice for a school that has won 16 state football titles.
At L-R, Jones said he knows the coaching staff expects him to be a leader. He was named to this year's preseason All-South Atlantic Conference second-team defense.
"That's not good enough, though," Jones said.
An artist in his spare time, Jones spent the off season drawing his own conclusions about how the Bears will do this season.
He said some of the players from last year thought about transferring.
"The guys that (stayed) just manned up, took the tougher road and are trying to bring this program back up," Jones said.
Since 1994, the Bears' only non-losing season was in 2005 when they went 5-5.
Jones says L-R is ready to change that.
"We have the mentality to do better than they did," he said of past teams.
He also joked that those teams don't have what this year's Bears do: "Well, those teams didn't have Dewayne Jones," he said with a laugh.
Chuckles aside, Jones is serious about helping the Bears move the program forward with more wins this season as his own football journey continues.
"I haven't gotten any less coaching here than I would have at N.C. State," he said. "And I couldn't have tried any harder than I am now.
"When you make a choice in life, you have to work with it and make the best of it."
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