Georgia received an early holiday gift Friday when junior linebacker Jordan Jenkins announced he will be returning for his senior season with the Bulldogs in 2015. Jenkins made the announcement via his Twitter account late Friday morning.

According to a story by UGAsports.com, Jenkins’ father, Ronald, explained his son’s decision to return was made with his heart and not his mind.

“His heart is there,” Ronald Jenkins said. “What it came down to it, he was just so invested in wanting to be in Athens. It has his heart. He was leaning towards coming back the whole time but we wanted him to make the best decision with all the factors in front of him.”

The announcement comes less than a week after head coach Mark Richt announced the return of a number of other prominent UGA juniors at last week’s football banquet in Athens. Among those he revealed would return for 2015 were linebacker Leonard Floyd, wideout Malcolm Mitchell and offensive tackle John Theus.

You can now add Jenkins to that list of players returning for 2015. The junior will turn down a chance to enter the NFL draft, where he was slotted by CBS Sports as the seventh-best outside linebacker in the draft class. CBS projected Jenkins might have been a second- or third-round pick in the draft.

Jenkins was a ferocious pass-rushing machine in 2014, recording 9.0 tackles for loss, 4.5 sacks and a whopping 20 quarterback hurries. He’s now amassed 142 tackles, 29.0 tackles for loss, 14.5 sacks, 47 quarterback hurries, four forced fumbles and a blocked kick in three years with the Dawgs.