It’s not how you start a football game, it’s how you finish it.
The Class 3A O’Dea football team is grateful for that fact after its opening-game victory over Class 4A Bothell. The Fighting Irish overcame a terrible start and a 13-0 halftime deficit at Memorial Stadium behind a standout second-half performance from Jason Brown Jr.
Brown, a running back who is listed as a four-star prospect by the recruiting sites, scored a pair of touchdowns while rushing for 198 yards in a 21-13 O’Dea victory. Brown’s first touchdown was a 25-yarder that put the Fighting Irish on the board at the 8:11 mark in the third quarter, and his second was a 68-yard run that gave O’Dea the lead for good with 1:47 to go in the third.
“He’s special; we know that,” O’Dea coach Monte Kohler said. “He gets stuff outside the playbook, and that one run he made for the second touchdown was completely outside the playbook.”
O’Dea’s final scoring play came on a 29-yard touchdown pass from junior quarterback Luke D’Anna to senior receiver Darian Maragh on fourth-and-17 with 5:20 remaining.
Early on, it looked like O’Dea might be in for a rough start to the season.
Bothell recovered an onside kick on the opening play, and took a 7-0 lead on a 30-yard touchdown pass from senior Ryder Jacobsen to junior Tyson Hoke. After a three-and-out from O’Dea, the Cougars added six more points in the opening seconds of the second quarter when senior Bryce Kooy took the ball in for a 7-yard touchdown run and a 13-0 lead.
On defense, Bothell dominated O’Dea early at the line of scrimmage in the first half, but O’Dea’s offense finally broke through midway through the third quarter, when Brown began his heroics.
Bothell responded to Brown’s first score with a 74-yard drive that featured a 31-yard pass from Jacobsen to senior Cody Petrin, and a crucial pass interference call on the Irish defense that gave Bothell the ball at the 15-yard line. O’Dea’s Tyler Bugbee picked off a Jacobsen pass inside the 10.
Brown took the ball for a 68-yard jaunt on the next play, and O’Dea was off and rolling.
Brown would’ve had three touchdowns and about 30 more rushing yards added to his total, but an impressive rush reminiscent of Marshawn Lynch’s 2010 “Beast Quake” run was called back on a penalty.
“Usually when teams go down early, they start to beat themselves up,” Brown said. “… But in that locker room, we’re all one unit, we’re all one team, and we just kept encouraging each other, and letting each other know that we’re going to make plays in that second half.”
Bothell’s defense simply couldn’t stop Brown in the second half, and coach Tom Bainter knew it.
“What he did in the second half is he was patient, and he allowed the blocks to occur,” Bainter said. “Then he cuts back, and once he’s in space, he’s gone. That’s what he did. He was able to take our speed out of it and neutralize it.”
Bainter blamed much of his team’s struggles on a lack of conditioning. At Bothell, there is a club called the “Cougar Run Club,” for players who do not make the required number of lifting sessions during summer workouts. According to Bainter, that number is at its highest total in the 23 years he has coached at Bothell.
“When you’re not ready to go and you’re not conditioned, that’s a tough thing,” Bainter said. “Their guys were better. They’re physical, they outlasted us, their running back finally got going and they made plays. We didn’t, and hats off to them. They were the better team today.”
Jacobsen finished the night with 162 passing yards, and while Kooy and Jacobsen combined for 153 yards on the ground.
The Irish finished with 54 yards through the air, as Brown provided the majority of the offense.
“It’s great morale for the team, and for the unit,” Brown said. “Of course, getting down early is never the best feeling, but our guys fight strong, we play hard, and we came out with the W. That’s all that matters.”