Staff photo / Neel Madhavan
JFK senior Antwan Brown (2) runs through a tackle during the Eagles’ first round playoff game against Monroeville on Oct. 30.
WARREN — For John. F Kennedy senior Antwan Brown, playing football has always been a labor of love.
He first started playing when he was 5 years old when his parents enrolled him in a youth flag football league.
Now, he’s part of the blistering three-pronged offensive attack — consisting of Brown, fellow senior Michael Mauro and sophomore quarterback Caleb Hadley — that has propelled JFK to the regional semifinals of the Division VII state playoffs.
“We look out for each other,” Brown said. “Like, if (Mauro) runs the ball, I block. If I run the ball, (Mauro) blocks. Also, with guys like Mike (Mauro), we have team chemistry. It’s not just one of us, it’s all of us.”
This season is Brown’s first with the Eagles after he transferred from Liberty prior to the season.
A year after a state championship game appearance, JFK was primed to make another run with Hadley and Mauro leading the way. However, Brown’s addition has raised the Eagles’ power offense to a whole new level.
Through the first two games of the playoffs, Brown is averaging 319 all-purpose yards per game and has scored 11 total touchdowns, while the offense as a whole is averaging 542 total yards and 59.5 points per game. Mauro has averaged more than 100 rushing yards in the playoffs and has four total touchdowns.
“We’ve got a little bit of a three-headed monster on offense,” head coach Dom Prologo said. “Our quarterback can not only throw it, he can run it. Our running back is kind of like Beast Mode (Marshawn Lynch) from Seattle — he runs so darn hard. Then you’ve got Antwan, who is not only a receiver, but runs the ball from the receiver position. He runs it as a quarterback and he runs it as a tailback. When those three are on the field together, it puts a defense in a bind because you’ve got three guys that can score from anywhere.”
After this past weekend’s 62-28 second round win over Cuyahoga Heights, Prologo pointed to the Rootstown game in Week 7 as the turning point for Brown’s ingratiation into the offense.
After Brown joined the team prior to the season, Prologo said it took time for him to find his fit in the team’s scheme as he adjusted to a new system with new formations and terminology.
“It also took awhile for our coaches to find where he fits and how our offense would work with him as a huge piece of it,” Prologo said. “Any kid who’s going to come into a new offense, it’s going to take them a little bit of time to get used to that scheme and their role in it.”
Prologo said everything for JFK’s power offense revolves around its offensive line — consisting of Patrick Valent, Nathan Bartoe, Eddie Kiernan, Will Toth, Sam Hindi and tight end Brady Mocella.
Brown said the offensive line “blocking and doing the right things” has been one of the biggest reasons for his and the rest of the offense’s success scoring and moving the ball.
“No matter how good our skill players — that three-headed monster — are, if you don’t have an offensive line like the way our kids are performing, those three guys are going to be average,” Prologo said. “Being as physical as they are, being a power offense, that’s who we are. Our pass game is predicated on us being able to run the ball and our run game is predicated on our offensive line knocking people off the ball. That’s what we do and that’s who we are.”
No. 3 JFK faces 2-seed St. Paul at 7 p.m. Saturday night at Medina in the Division VII regional semifinal.
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Travis Burnett
A pioneer in the flag football community, Travis helped co-found the Flag Football World Championship Tour, FlagSpin and USA Flag. Featuring 15+ years of content creation for the sport of flag football, creating and managing the largest flag football tournaments on the planet, coaching experience at the youth and adult level as well as an active player with National and World Championship level experience.
