With my National Camp Series (NCS) and my private lessons, through Husted Kicking, I see –and coach- a lot of high school football kickers. And having such vivid memories of my own time kicking in high school, I can certainly relate to their goals, frustrations, dreams and desires.
I have many good memories from kicking
on my high school team. And they include both the ‘ups and downs’ that go with
playing the game.
When I started playing organized
football in 9th grade, I actually played on a city league team, the North
Hampton Bulldogs. And my motivation to
play was less about football then other things I had on my mind at that time.
I was with some friends playing
video games in the arcade at the local shopping mall. Then some girlfriends of
ours (who were cheerleaders for the Bulldogs) came in and said that the team
needed some players. They said (convincingly) that we should go out for the
team.
Wanting to impress the girls, the
three of us decided to try out for the team.
As it turned out, I ended up
being a valuable asset to the Bulldogs since kicking extra points in the city
league earned you two points instead of one.
We won a few games by a one-point margin from my kicking the extra
point(s).
The North Hampton Bulldogs were
located in an area of our city that fed into a different high school, Bethel
High (think Allen Iverson), and at one point, my Bulldog’s coach introduced me
to Bethel’s head coach who asked me where I lived.
Needless to say, he wasn’t happy
to hear I was zoned for Hampton High, but wasn’t attending the school where he
coached. He asked if I would be interested in attending Bethel if it could be “arranged.” I politely declined. In retrospect…a good decision.
My sophomore year, I went out for
the Hampton Crabbers and made the team.
The Crabbers were a power-house
program that always had strong talent that attracted college scouts. The team’s kicker (a senior) and I were very
comparable in skill level. So the head coach, Mike Smith, told me that he was
going to let the senior start since I had two more years.
Although I didn’t like the
decision, I fully respected it. I did a
few kickoffs in that season, but spent most of the time on the sideline. We
rolled through the season and playoffs undefeated to win a State Championship
against T.C. Williams High School. Yes,
the same school the movie “Remember the Titans” was based on.
Heading into my junior year, I
knew that the job of kicking for the team was mine. But it turned out I would
have even more responsibility than I thought as I was told that I would also be
punting for the team.
Having never punted on a regular
basis, I started to hone those skills as well.
That year we had another solid
team and my value at the beginning of the season was mainly on kickoffs. Having grown stronger between my sophomore
and junior season, I was consistently putting the ball in the end-zone on
kickoffs. This helped our defense out
tremendously and made the coaches stoked.
We were undefeated again until we hit an unexpected two game losing
streak mid-season.
Our coaches made sure we “righted
our ship” and we finished off the season strong, earning another trip to the
playoffs.
I had a few field goals during
the regular season, but my biggest kick came during the second round of the
playoffs. We were playing Green Run High
School and right before the half, I drilled a 37 yard field goal to put us up
10-0. We ended up winning the game
17-7.
We then went on to beat Salem High School 14-0 in the State Championship game for our 2nd title in a row.
Now, not all moments on the field
are ‘memorable’ ones. However I’ll never forget that during this last game, and
as I was jogging out for a punt, my coach yelled at me to “coffin corner” the
ball. No problem.
The snap was good, however as I
turned to angle the punt and made contact something didn’t feel right as it
came off of my foot. As I looked up to
see where the ball went I realized that I had shanked it into the stands for a
net punt of three yards.
Luckily, that didn’t have an effect
on the outcome.
Regardless of that punt, I ended
up making 6 field goals that season and about 80% of my kickoffs were touch
backs. That was enough to earn honors
as:
●
All District Kicker
●
All Region Kicker
●
All State Kicker
During our first game, I missed an extra point. I was mad at myself, but convinced myself that my goal of All American was still attainable. However, during our second game, I missed an extra point and had a 50 yard field goal fall short. I was devastated. We won the game, but I was upset with myself and found myself crying in my locker. My All American honor was surely gone now.
On the bus ride home I sat and thought about the rest of the season and what I needed to do to have it be successful. I realized that I had put too much pressure on myself. I decided that I was going to relax, focus on helping ‘the team’ win, no matter what happened.
We lost our last game of the season to our rivals Bethel, but won our district. So, once again we were headed to the playoffs.
We won our first two games, which were at home, but had to travel for the state semi-final game against Faquier High School. They were undefeated and had an impressive offense. The game was in December in the foothills of the Shenandoah Mountains. It was pretty cold.
As we got off of the bus I went to check out the field. As it turned out they had heavily soaked (make that drowned) the area where I would be kicking my extra points from. I was flattered that they thought enough of this ‘humble’ kicker to take that extra measure.
The game was an intense battle. I started off the scoring by kicking a field goal and we were up 10 - 0 by half time. In the third quarter, they scored a touch-down. Since they didn’t have a reliable kicker they decided to go for “two.” We stopped them.
The score was now 10 - 6.
It was late in the fourth quarter and we had to punt deep in our own territory. The snap came back, but it was slow. I caught the ball and began my steps, but using my “kicker senses,” I felt someone close, so I quickly looked up and side stepped what would have been a sure blocked punt.
For a moment, I thought that I could run for the first down, but decided to punt the ball. The result was a 56 yard punt that pinned them deep in their territory. They went “four and out,” and we ran out the clock.
We went on to Hampton’s fourth state championship game in a row. It would be my third.
Once again, the State Championship was against T.C. Williams.
This game was a defensive struggle. We found ourselves down 10 - 0 heading into the fourth quarter. On our next possession we scored on a 72 yard touchdown pass. We were set up for the extra point, but had a new snapper as our normal snapper was injured.
This new snapper threw the ball a lot harder. The snap camp back like a bullet, but a little high. The holder couldn’t get a good handle on it and thus, we never got the kick off.
That missed extra point would come back to haunt us.
Time was running out and we needed a miracle. We held them on three downs and they had to punt with less than a minute left in the game. I was hoping for a block or a huge return. What happened next never crossed my mind. The snapper snapped the ball over the punters head and it went all the way down to the five yard line. Hampton Crabbers, first and goal. We would surely punch the ball in, right?
On first down, the crowd noise was so loud that we had a false start. On second down, we tried to throw a quick screen out wide, but the tailback dropped it and it was a lateral, so he had to jump on the ball. It was now third and goal from the 12 yard line. And this is where the missed kicked would haunt us, if we only would have converted the extra point, we could have played for the field goal to tie.
We had two downs to score a touchdown. Then disaster struck. We ran a corner route with two options for our quarterback to throw the ball. He could lob it up over the defender where only the receiver could have a chance to catch it or throw a bullet fast enough that the defender wouldn’t have a chance to intercept it.
Unfortunately, our quarterback lobbed it, but not far enough. Their defender picked it off and ran it out of bounds. We lost. I couldn’t believe it.
It definitely wasn’t the way that I had envisioned my last high school football game to end. I was expecting to have three state titles. The one consolation was that I again received All District Kicker, All Region Kicker and All State Kicker, plus one more. I had received Honorable Mention All American Kicker.
As I said, my high school kicking years were filled with many ups and downs, but those were the experiences that would shape and prepare me as I moved to the college level.
