Former Lakeland High School head football coach Bryan Potts has been hired as the new defensive coordinator and defensive backs coach for Denbigh High School.

“It’s a fresh beginning for me,” he said.

Potts will continue to teach at Lakeland, but he lives in Newport News, only eight miles from Denbigh.

“Coming back home to coach is something that excites me,” he said.

His reputation has preceded him to the Patriots, due in part to their head coach Marcellus Harris.

“We’re familiar with each other from high school to our first years in coaching,” Potts said.

They were teammates at Homer L. Ferguson High School and later got their first coaching experience at Warwick High School.

“That was the bond that brought us together, football, and kept us together,” Harris said.

Potts later coached at King’s Fork High School as the defensive backs coach and then spent the next six years as the Bulldogs’ defensive coordinator before being hired as the Cavaliers’ head coach in 2013.

Lakeland went 1-9 in 2013 and improved to 3-8 in 2014.

The school opted to go in another direction and replace Potts, and when Harris heard he was looking for somewhere to coach, he gave Potts a call.

“He could only be an asset to the program,” Harris said. “Whenever you can get somebody who’s been a head coach to join the staff, that’s always beneficial, as well, because they know what you go through.”

Potts desires to return to the ranks of high school head coaches eventually, and he looked into a couple of head coaching opportunities after his stint at Lakeland.

He explored the possibility of Menchville High School and interviewed for the top job at Jamestown High School.

“After those two head coaching opportunities didn’t materialize, the Denbigh situation presented itself,” he said.

The Patriots went 3-7 last season in what Potts considers a highly talented district.

“You’ve got to roll up your sleeves and go to work,” he said. “We’re looking forward to being back in postseason play.”