Former NFL star has rebuilt a program from scratch. ‘It’s pretty freaking cool.’

During Michael Madden’s freshman year at Sayre, the Spartans didn’t have a football program.

Then, that spring, Madden and his classmates learned his middle school coach would help revive a sport that hadn’t been played by the school in more than four decades.

“As soon as he came, I went out and tried to get as many people in my grade, you know, people who had never actually really played before, even in middle school, to get out there and play,” said Madden, now a senior wide receiver and safety. “It’s been really awesome to see what’s happened.”

That coach was former NFL and Marshall University quarterback Chad Pennington.

And what’s happened is the Spartans will begin their first full varsity season Friday night at home against Eminence in Kentucky high school football’s Class A division for the state’s smallest schools.

They will begin it under stadium lights that were added to their athletic complex off Athens-Boonesboro Road last year — in front of a 400-hundred seat grandstand that didn’t exist until this season — and below a still-under-construction full-size press box that didn’t exist two weeks ago.

The Spartans weren’t supposed to reach the varsity level by Madden’s senior year, but the determination of his team and his school has made that happen.

“It’s a sense of accomplishment,” Madden said. When Sayre started in 2018 “we had seniors playing against a JV team. We were struggling to field eight games. And now, we have a full varsity schedule, and we’re guaranteed to be in the playoffs.

“And, it’s like, pretty freaking cool.”

Indeed. But the road ahead won’t be easy. Five of Sayre’s nine 2020 opponents had winning records last year, and the district the Kentucky High School Athletic Association has slotted the Spartans into as a temporary filler until they can be properly aligned happens to be where defending state champion Pikeville resides.

None of that matters.

“I didn’t come into high school thinking I was going to be able to play football,” said senior Ford Webb. “It’s been really special to make something new happen.”

The Spartans roster has grown from 24 players last year to 32 this year and it already has an NCAA Division I-caliber quarterback.

Cole Pennington, a 6-foot-2, 190-pound junior, received an offer last week from Marshall, the same school where his dad lit up scoreboards 20 years ago. Cole passed for 1,384 yards and 10 touchdowns in eight games last season. His 173 yards per game average ranked 34 in the state.

“I was just excited to get the opportunity to play at the next level,” Pennington said of the Marshall offer. “And to just continue to play a sport that I love. I’m excited to see where the path’s going to take me and how I can get better. I’m ready to keep working.”

For Coach Pennington, all of this is the realization of what he and the school’s administration wanted for Sayre at the beginning — helping build a sense of community, camaraderie and leadership for the players and their classmates.

“It has been a challenge,” Pennington said. “And part of it is helping the school understand how athletics can truly invigorate your school and partner with academics. That’s what I’m all about is showing how our athletic program can partner with the academic side to develop the whole child.

“That’s what this football program is about — using the game of football as a platform to develop these young men. So when they leave Sayre, they feel confident. They feel prepared that they can take on the world.”

This story was originally published September 9, 2020 at 7:35 AM.

Jared Peck

Lexington Herald-Leader

859-488-2883

Jared Peck, the Herald-Leader’s Digital Sports Writer, covers high school athletics and has been with the company as a writer and editor for more than 20 years. Support my work with a digital subscription