All things considered, Young senior Aaron Champion wanted to score his first varsity touchdown last week.
But his 70-yard scoring run on Saturday afternoon at Rockne Stadium meant much more in the grand scheme of things, so he’ll take it.
Champion’s touchdown and Solomon Bradley’s extra point with 7:57 remaining completed the Dolphins’ rally from 12 down in the fourth quarter, helping them slip past Johnson 20-19.
“I was a little bit slow that first quarter,” Champion said. “Coach was telling me, ‘Man, you’ve gotta get those feet moving. You’ve got to stop tiptoeing.’ ”
Champion had two touchdowns called back because of penalties in a lopsided Week 2 victory against Perspectives.
“When I got called back, I was a little bit saucy,” Champion said. “But I’m just happy to get the win, pull through for my team.”
The feeling was mutual.
“We were telling his mom last week we were trying to get him in [the end zone],” Young coach Dan Finger said. “And then all of a sudden he breaks one.
“You see the track speed, you see the hard work. Just a guy you can trust on both sides of the ball. I know his teammates loved seeing him break that one.”
Champion, who also plays linebacker, had more offensive snaps because Young (3-0, 1-0 Public League Red) was short-handed.
Max Warner, the Dolphins’ top running back, was hurt last week and didn’t dress on Saturday. Finger doesn’t expect his absence to be long-term, though. Then starting quarterback Von Konrad was knocked out of the game early in the third quarter.
That prompted Young to lean hard into some unorthodox play-calling — specifically, one quarterback sneak after another.
There was a good reason, though. The Dolphins’ center is 6-3, 290-pound Nikola Dale, a four-year starter who’s also a mainstay on the defensive line.
“The O-line has always been the spine of the team,” Finger said. “They’re our best group. I think they’re the best group in the Public League. They’re experienced guys and we rode them at the end.”
In particular, backup quarterback J’siah Purnell kept taking snaps and following Dale.
“This is the first year where we really had a big O-line,” Dale said. “And we were able to dominate up front, especially on a QB sneak, so we were able to go out there and do our thing.”
Dale appreciates the fact that Young’s coaches keep asking him to pave the way,
“It makes me feel appreciated,” he said. “They recognize what we can do. But I couldn’t do anything without my other guys out there. Juan [Cepeda], my other guard Alex Olszewski, they’re all pushing the guys, pinging them or driving them back, I couldn’t do anything by myself. So it’s all up to those five guys with me.”
Young’s other scores also came on big plays: Quinn Duhon’s 90-yard kickoff return just before halftime and Joseph Gray’s
42-yard run on the first play of the fourth quarter.
That helped offset a pair of defensive touchdowns by Johnson (0-3, 0-1), whose three losses have come by a total of 11 points. Carmellos Damon Magett had a 70-yard pick-six right before Duhon’s touchdown and Nashun Brown had a 25-yard scoop-and-score in the third quarter. The Pumas also had a 57-yard touchdown pass from Josiah Michael Morris to Larry Kohn in the first quarter.
Johnson, with an enrollment of 505, is the smallest program in the Public League Red. The Pumas have risen quickly in the city pecking order, from the low-level Blue in 2022 to the mid-level White last season and now to the top-level Red.
“We just need to figure out the finishing part,” Johnson coach Michael Willis said. “The biggest thing is they’ve learned how to deal with adversity. They’re not used to losing.” V