Mullins' Lowery excited for second season as head football coach approaches

Mullins – Slowly but surely,
Marc Lowery sees a football program being put in place.

Lowery is just getting to the point where he can celebrate his first year as head coach of
Mullins High School. Even though the Auctioneers went 0-10 in Lowery's first season, he feels good about the direction of the program after completing his first spring practice.

“We made it two weeks and we were able to play a spring game,” said Lowery, a former longtime high school assistant coach and college head coach for
Horry County
Schools. “It was the first time Mullins was able to do that. The players appreciated that.

“Last year things didn’t go the way we wanted. We told them the new season started at the end of last season. We tried to do a few things to motivate the guys, and they seemed to have bought into it. For those who went through the program, they said the spring numbers and the enthusiasm around the program, they weren't successful. I haven't seen this in a while.

Lowery said they have up to 38 student-athletes training, with a constant number of 34. Most of those numbers have come primarily from the rising junior and senior classes.

Lowry was pleased with the spring game and the interest it generated in the community.

“We posted it on the social media webpage.” he said. “We’re trying to generate interest. We don't pound the streets to get the kids in. We want them to look at what we're doing and say, “I want to be a part of this.” “

Mullins had just four seniors on last year's team, all one-way starters. This means that auctioneers will see the vast majority of their starters return.

Rising junior quarterback will lead returns
Kanazzion Bethea. He completed 120 of 218 passes for 1,476 yards and 15 touchdowns against just seven interceptions. Bethea also totaled 297 yards on 71 carries.

“He’s doing really well,” Lowery said of Bethea. “A lot of the offense is RPO (read-pass option) and it’s like he didn’t miss a thing in the spring. Everything clicked. It seems like he's seeing the bigger picture, and starting to understand. He's starting to see how versatile he can be. The offense can grow by leaps and bounds from where it was.

Mullins also has many returning receivers who played big roles in the passing game last season.
Justin Reaves Jr. had 23 catches for 162 yards, junior tight end
Braden
Hugues had eight catches for 129 yards,
LeBron Avant had 16 catches for 311 yards,
Ayntwain Crawford had eight catches for 115 yards,
Andrew Littlejohn had 12 catches for 68 yards, and junior
Tyron Allen had 10 catches for 144 yards and also carried the ball 36 times for 186 yards. Senior

had seven catches for 209 yards.