Carlson's 'Power-Spread' Piling Up Points Despite Missing Leading Rusher
By
Doug Donnelly
Special for MHSAA.com
October 2, 2024
In Johnny Cash’s song “One Piece at a Time,” the main character collects car parts over the years to build a one-of-a-kind automobile.
At the end of the song, he’s asked what model it is. That’s where he runs into trouble.
“Well, it’s a ’49, ’50, ’51, ’52 …” Cash sings.
That automobile is a lot like the offense that has Gibraltar Carlson’s football team off to a 5-0 start.
“We pride ourselves in running the football here,” third-year head coach Jason Gendron said. “That is our identity. We play power football.”
That’s not the full story, however.
“We are multi-set, really,” Gendron said. “We have Wing-T principles, but we are a spread, Wing-T team that can go tight formations with two tight ends and three running backs. We also can go spread and run some run-pass option things. We also like to run counter off that.
“At the end of the day, power football is where we like to be. We can run that out of multiple sets. Everything we do is based off power.”
Marauders quarterback Joe Krolak agrees. Sort of.
“It’s power-spread,” Krolak said. “It’s hard to describe. We can go under center, or we can go spread.”
No matter what you call it, the Marauders’ offense is clicking in all gears. Carlson is averaging a two-point conversion shy of 50 points a game in their 5-0 start.
That Carlson is having success is not surprising or anything new. The Marauders have won four straight Downriver League championships and have made the playoffs seven years running. The surprising piece this season is they have done it without Division I college recruit Izaiah Wright, the junior running back who rushed for 1,965 yards and 31 touchdowns as a sophomore in leading Carlson to a 10-2 record.
Wright played in Week 1. But on the first offensive series of the game in Week 2, he went down with an ankle injury and hasn’t played since.
“It’s been a slow recovery,” Gendron said. “He’s been week-to-week. He’s getting closer. I do think he’ll play again this year, but I don’t know if he will be 100 percent this year.”
In his place, the Marauders were sharing carries among multiple backs until last week when junior Avery Ortiz got the full workload. He responded with 200 yards rushing and multiple touchdowns.
Gendron said he and the Carlson coaches saw the potential in Ortiz.
“Avery has been the running back who has emerged,” Gendron said. “We feel Avery is one of the best backs in our conference and southeast Michigan.”
Ortiz has been Wright’s backup for a couple of seasons. Last year Gendron asked Ortiz about changing positions to get him on the field, and he started playing safety. This season, with Wright out, Ortiz found himself on the offensive side of the ball again.
“He has great vision and is really good on his cuts,” Gendron said. “Avery is a running back at heart. He’s always wanted to be the running back here, but you have a kid in front of him who is a Division I player who beat him out. That’s just the way it goes. At least he was humble enough to accept that and find another place to play. For him to get that back, seize the moment and run with it, is the credit to the type of kid he is.”
Krolak said the offense hasn’t skipped a beat with Ortiz as the featured back.
“Everybody knows in this program it’s next man up,” Krolak said. “We have a lot of athletes in this program who can do the same things he can do. Avery has really stepped up big. He’s looking phenomenal. He’s a great running back and has carried us through this.”
Gendron called Krolak the team’s first-half MVP. Krolak has completed 44 of 62 passes for 669 yards and six touchdowns and rushed for another 406 yards and nine touchdowns.
“Joe is a very dangerous runner and has gotten better at throwing,” Gendron said. “He’s a dual-threat quarterback. You can’t just key on Izaiah or Avery. You have to have eyes on Joe. He’s been the player of the year for us without question. He’s leading us and doing everything I’ve asked him to do at the position. He’s having a great year.”
Krolak, a senior, said he was ready for his number to be called more with Wright out.
“I knew I would get the ball more,” Krolak said. “Coach told me I was going to run the ball more and throw it around, and I was completely ready for it.”
Carlson has several more weapons, including tight end Drew Sikora and receivers Brendan Stanley and Landon Vida. Everything starts up front, however.
“I tell our offensive line that they are the most important position group on the field, both our offensive and defensive lines,” Gendron said. “They have bought in and embraced that and the fact that we want to be a power, smash-mouth football team.”
Carlson’s been pretty good on defense, too, giving up just six touchdowns all season.
Gendron is a Monroe Jefferson graduate who played for Marc Cisco, who retired after 47 years coaching the Bears. That’s where Gendron learned the fundamentals of the game and about power football.
“It works,” Gendron said. “It worked back then for Marc, and it works for us. It’s good football. I believe in it. The kids buy into it. There’s nothing better from an offensive standpoint when you can get three yards at will and you can call the play again and it works.”
The current offense is a mix of Gendron’s years playing at Jefferson and schematic strategies incorporated by Dan Kalbfleisch, the Carlson athletic director and assistant football coach.
“We’ve blended Dan’s experience with his spread concepts and the things I value about offensive football – the ground and pound, power football concepts – into one offense. Dan brings the pre-snap, tempo, no-huddle offense with motion and getting guys into space. That’s what you see. We both believe in running the football.”
Carlson has some tough games ahead, but Gendron is pleased with how the season is shaping up. With a little luck, they might get Wright back in time for a playoff run.
“We are on schedule right now,” he said. “Our guys have done what they need to do at this point. We take things one week at a time. Trenton is on the clock right now.”
Doug Donnelly has served as a sports and news reporter and city editor over 25 years, writing for the Daily Chief-Union in Upper Sandusky, Ohio from 1992-1995, the Monroe Evening News from 1995-2012 and the Adrian Daily Telegram since 2013. He's also written a book on high school basketball in Monroe County and compiles record books for various schools in southeast Michigan. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Jackson, Washtenaw, Hillsdale, Lenawee and Monroe counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Gibraltar Carlson quarterback Joe Krolak considers his best option during last week’s win over Southgate Anderson. (Middle) Carlson coach Jason Gendron pumps up his team during a practice. (Below) The Marauders’ Avery Ortiz drags a defender downfield. (Game photos by Kim Britt; practice photo by Niles Kruger/Monroe News.)
Fueled by Year's Worth of Motivation, Lenawee Christian Caps Perfect Run
By
Jason Juno
Special for MHSAA.com
November 18, 2023
MARQUETTE --- Adrian Lenawee Christian won MHSAA Finals titles in its first two seasons of 8-player football.
But last year the Cougars didn’t, falling to eventual Division 1 champion Martin in a Regional Final.
“I’m not joking when I say the Monday after we got beat by Martin, they were all in the weight room,” Lenawee Christian coach Bill Wilharms said.
Since then, they’ve been doing early Saturday morning workouts, they’ve gone to powerlifting meets with him, anything to get better, anything to get back to where they want to be – lifting the championship trophy.
The Cougars did that Saturday afternoon after they defeated Marion 36-18 in the Division 2 Final at the Superior Dome in Marquette.
“That’s why we’ve been doing it,” said senior quarterback Sam Lutz, who was 20 of 23 for 350 yards through the air while accounting for all five touchdowns (two rushing, three passing). “It’s the kind of legacy we’ve been trying to make. You put in the work, you get the results.”
They certainly get the results. The Cougars went undefeated like they did in their first two championship runs, and this 18-point win was their closest game of the season.
Lutz and the rest of the seniors had one last chance to win a title they could call their own. He said that early exit last fall was the motivation to get here, and this win proved to be a pretty good feeling.
“I played a little bit as a sophomore, but it’s certainly different to be one of the main leaders of this team and it feels really great,” Lutz said.
“Martin was the better team last year; they took it to us in that Regional,” Wilharms said. “This group of seniors, they wanted one of their own, they wanted their own legacy.”
He said it was awesome to see their hard work pay off.
“What high school kid wants to get up at 6 o’clock on Saturday morning?” Wilharms said. “They come in, they believe in it. It’s nice. And we have fun. The coaches lift and stuff, so it’s just a blast. And then we walk away sore and they laugh at us, and that’s a good thing, too.”
Marion had a long road to Marquette as well.
While their five-hour drive was actually about two hours shorter than Lenawee Christian’s, the Eagles had been trying for several years to get here.
They finally got to the Superior Dome after always running into juggernaut Powers North Central. The Jets won the three previous Division 2 titles after defeating Marion in a Semifinal every time.
“It was the final step. We finally made it here,” Marion coach Chad Grundy said. “We came up a little bit short, but they’re a real good team and we just made a couple mistakes. They’re too good for us to make those mistakes.”
The game started out in Marion’s favor.
Senior Gavin Prielipp returned the opening kickoff 76 yards for a 6-0 lead just nine seconds in.
“Most people don’t kick to us,” Grundy said. “He ran one back last week, too. It’s been a great season, and we’re just proud of our kids.”
Wilharms expected a good effort from Marion, and saw it right away.
“We knew they were a heck of a football team – you don't get to 12-0 and the state championship (otherwise), so we knew there were gonna be some bumps and stuff along the way,” he said. “Unfortunately, I didn’t think it was going to be that early.”
Lenawee Christian scored 36 straight points after that.
The Cougars led just 1 minute, 41 seconds later when Lutz found senior tight end Easton Boggs for a 15-yard touchdown. The Eli Brainard extra point made it 7-6.
Lutz ran for touchdowns of seven and one yard as Lenawee Christian expanded its lead to 20-6 early in the second quarter. He found Boggs again for a 12-yard TD midway through the second quarter, and a 42-yard field goal by Max Stamats with 20 seconds left in the half made it 29-6.
Lutz hit Boggs for the third and final time with six seconds left in the third quarter. The Brainard extra point made it 36-6. In all, Boggs caught nine passes for 210 yards.
“Easton’s been a force for us through seventh and eighth grade, and Sammy came as a ninth grader,” Wilharms said. “I hope (Lutz) is in the consideration for the 8-player Player of the Year, because I think he’s definitely deserving of it.”
Marion scored two fourth-quarter touchdowns, a 30-yard pass from sophomore quarterback Collin McCrimmon to junior James Williams and a three-yard run by junior Cole Meyer.
Lenawee Christian outgained Marion 405-274 and was just the second team to score more than 14 points against the Eagles this year.
“Just the speed,” Grundy said of what makes the Cougars so tough. “They’ve got so much speed everywhere. They’re very well-coached. We struggled with that when they spread it out, trying to defend the quarterback and defend all their receivers.”
It was six years ago when Wilharms bought into the type of workouts that promoted the kind of speed that keeps his team coming to the Upper Peninsula.
On the field, the Cougars enjoy playing offense, which is easy to understand with the way they can score. But Wilharms thought the defense played even better Saturday, suffocating a Marion offense that came in averaging 55 points per game.
“They just were awesome,” he said.
PHOTOS (Top) Lenawee Christian’s Easton Boggs (10) and Sam Lutz celebrate a touchdown Saturday at the Superior Dome. (Middle) The Cougars’ Jesse Miller (2) forces Marion’s Collin McCrimmon out of bounds. (Below) Lutz finds a receiver as Marion’s James Williams applies pressure. (Click for more photos by Cara Kamps.)