East Bernard (Texas) High School head coach Jeremy Jenkins and his wife, East Bernard Junior High teacher Brandy Jenkins, were killed in a car accident on Saturday night, the school district announced Sunday.
According to the Texas Department of Public Safety, the couple were traveling north on Texas Highway 60 when their Tesla Model Y left the roadway and overturned. The couple were pronounced dead at the scene.
“Jeremy and Brandy were much more than their titles or the roles they held within our schools,” East Bernard superintendent Courtney Hudgins wrote in a letter to the school district, according to the Houston Chronicle. “They were colleagues, educators, mentors, friends and family.”
“East Bernard has always been a place where people show up for one another, and now is a time when that love and support are needed more than ever,” Hudgins wrote. “In the days ahead, we will need to lean on one another with love, patience, compassion and grace.”
The Brahmas, located southwest of Houston, are coming off a 10-5 season that began 0-3 and ended one game shy of an appearance in the Class 3A Division II state championship game. The club is currently slated to open its season Aug. 28 at home against Sweeny.
“Right now, football doesn’t matter,” the East Bernard Athletic Booster Club wrote on Facebook. “Wins don’t matter. None of it does. What matters is surrounding these boys with the same kind of love and support their family has given to so many of ours.”
The couple leaves behind three sons, Tyson, Gage and Jake.
Jeremy Jenkins was preparing for his third season as the head coach at East Bernard after spending two seasons as the head coach and athletics director at Harmony, with previous head coaching stops at Mount Enterprise and Tenaha, and more than two decades in education. He was 51 years old. Brandy Jenkins, 46, had just begun her first year at East Bernard Junior High this past week.
“He watched film non-stop, coached up our kids in the most loving way, truly wanted what was best for all kids, challenged us to see things through a different lens, loved his fellow coaches, and was an ‘all in’ kind of man,” Hudgins wrote.
The Texas Department of Public Safety said the crash was still under investigation upon the announcement.
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