By Ed Muniz- Jenn-Anne Geldhill
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ELMHURST- The 9U Jr. Celtics week seven matchups of the Chicagoland Pop Warner football schedule saw them trekking to Elmhurst Illinois to take on the Elmhurst Bears.
Coming into the game Coach Gavin McCarron’s team was looking to end a losing streak that began back in week four of the season in its finale of the season with a bye next week.
All toll, the Jr. Celtics have had a difficult year having won a single game leading up to this encounter. Offensively, the Jr. Celtics have struggled to find the endzone being shut out in all their losses.
Against the Elmhurst Bears, they faced an opponent who had also seen success come difficult, winning just one more game than the visitors while also ending their own losing streak a week earlier.
As it turned out, both offenses were stymied throughout their encounter as defenses were controlling play up until the 3-minute mark of the last quarter.
A 73-yard burst up the middle for the games only score, gave the Bears a 6-0 victory on October 6 and gave the Jr. Celtics their fourth consecutive loss and end at 1-6 on the season.
“What I am most proud of with this team is the boys never quit, they gave it all they had every play every game,” said Coach McCarron. “There was also a lot of improvement from where we were at the beginning of the year. We had nearly half of our team new to football so, although the scoreboard my say differently, I felt we improved a lot and never quit in any game.”
When asked what the most difficult part of this season was, McCarron added,
“For us, it was our inability to score when we got into the red zone. We could sustain a drive of several plays, get into the red zone and then be unable to execute scoring plays for whatever reason. We simply couldn’t finish off drives. That was very difficult for us all season.”
Although the losses piled up, the Jr. Celtics did play a decent defense all season and McCarron acknowledge that.
“Again, it may not be evident looking at the scoreboard, but we actually played pretty well defensively all year, what hurt us was big play scoring. We weren’t seeing teams drive on our defense all the time, we were hurt by the big play and I thought a lot of it was poor tackling and poor positioning. When we had guys in positions, we just couldn’t make a stop and execute the tackle for the stop.”
Defensively, the Jr. Celtics saw excellent efforts from Austin Boyer and Holden Reid. Each was doing all they could to keep the Bears from scoring with each contributing with multiple stops and assists.
“It was a tough game for us,” said Holden. “I feel like we were struggling on what the play was on offense. Coach did a lot of plays in the huddle and then we forgot. We weren’t operating much like we used to and not singling out our guys.”
“We’re not making those big plays that other teams are for some reason. I feel its more a mental game for us, if there’s a big play against us, we kinda get down on ourselves. We just have to keep our heads up even if we are down. We are a good team, we just need that cohesiveness as a team and play better.”
Linebacker Austin Boyer also commented on what worked well and what needed to improve.
“After halftime, they didn’t run a play inside where I was at, so coach said if I see going your way like trips right or trips left, I should scooch over to it and that worked for us in stopping them,” said Boyer.
“When they ran away from me, I just had to chase down the play and if I didn’t make the tackle one of my teammates did and we didn’t get a lot of yards against us until that one play. For me. The best part of playing defense is tackling guys and also stripping the ball. I’ve ripped the ball out of a couple peoples hand this year. I think our offense needs to get better for sure.”
Offensively, Quarterback Camden Fitzgerald was doing all he could to lead his Jr. Celtics offense, occasionally calling his own number on runs and trying to sustain drives throughout the game. Using Cohen McCarron’s running ability, Fitzgerald was getting pays off quickly but was facing a lot of defensive pressure from the Bears nearly the entire game.
“I think the struggles with the offense like Holden (Reid) said was our communicating better, a few times I got the wrong number (play) to call. Im getting the wrong play from my X (player that brings in the play) so that was a part of the bad communication, it was hard because of that. I think instead we need to work with our X’s bringing the plays to us in practice. It will help us with the play calling.”
Although the season didn’t go as planned, Coach McCarron has a good mixture of talent, both new and veteran players that seem to enjoy playing football regardless of the score and also have suggestions on how to improve their team.
This is a team with too much talent and lots of coaching available to them which is why the 1-6 record is an enigma after reaching the Playoffs last year. Bumped up to Division 2, McCarron knew the competition would be harder. Still, a tweak here and there is all that is needed for these Jr. Celtics to be back in contention next season.
Other Jr. Celtics never quitting all season are Aiden Cesek, Zakai and Zachary Obeng, Angelo Cameo, Caesar Kanu, Jesus Yepez, Keaton Kastys, Quinn Collins, Clay Parker, Alexander Wallace, Grayson Tadin, Leo Blythe, Cayden Precin, Chase Eddington, Elijah Bogel, Michael Salem, Porter Ronk, Henry Richardson, Zachary Bal-Denton, Colin Petty and Henry Bass.
