Michael Dawkins knew in the preseason he was going to face a challenge in his first season as head football coach at Central Academy.
But Dawkins never imagined he would spend as much time being so much more than a football coach.
After starting the season with 12 players on the roster, injuries to the Vikings’ two fastest players made things a little tougher on the team in its Mississippi Association of Independent Schools Eight-Man matchups. Later in the season, Central Academy had to forfeit a game to Calhoun Academy because two of its players had a family member with a medical emergency.
At 7 tonight, Central Academy (2-7) will wrap up its season of ups and downs with a game against Strider Academy.
“The players never put their heads down,” said Dawkins, who was an assistant coach on last season’s team and has served as an assistant coach on the school’s boys basketball and baseball teams. “The coaches never put our heads down. We just picked up our heads and said how are we going to keep going, and we did.”
Dawkins said Central Academy had to forfeit it game to Calhoun Academy after team members Jack Vandevender and Wyatt Norris left the team to go to St. Dominic Hospital in Jackson to be with their family and Christopher Newman, a Shuqualak native and a former standout athlete at Central Academy, who fell ill in late September and was rushed to in intensive care. Newman is a coach at Parklane Academy in McComb.
Dawkins said Shelia Vandevender, the mother of Jack, and Pam Norris, the sister of Shelia and the mother of Wyatt, teach at Central Academy, so Newman’s illness hit the football team’s family hard.
“They went to the hospital and thought he was going to pass,” Dawkins said of Vandevender and Norris.
But Dawkins and assistant coach Bryan Ricks, who are working as volunteer coaches, said the Vikings have bounced back as well as can be expected from the news about Newman and learned about teamwork, perseverance, and commitment. While the injuries might have been expected, Dawkins said the players have continued to believe and have kept family at their center. He said that always has been his message since he first worked with many of his current football in T-ball and in pee wee football leagues.
“You’re still going to get knocked down by life, but if you keep your faith and family at your center, you will end up working your way out of it,” Dawkins said. “If you have great support around you, you can work through anything. It’s not going to make life any easier, but when you hit trouble, because trouble is going to come, that is how you’re going to come out of it.”
Dawkins said the Vikings grew as a family and as a team. He said the team played well last week in a 16-14 loss to Calvary Christian. He hopes the life lessons he and Ricks have tried to show the players have meant a lot to them and have helped them navigate a difficult season. He also praised the families of the players for helping keeping the kids strong and helping to show them how to keep their heads up.
Through it all, Dawkins said the Vikings have continued to hit in practice and to give their best effort in games, even when they have been down to nine players in the last part of the season. He said he hasn’t been surprised by how his players have continued to work hard because he said they, too, are hard-headed.
Later tonight, Dawkins might have a different color shade of hair atop that hard head. He said Thursday he told his players they could dye his hair blond if the team beats Strider Academy. He said he isn’t sure if the players will dye his hair on the field, but he is sure plenty of people will be there with cameras to document it.
Even though one game won’t be able to make up for everything the team has been through this season, Dawkins said he has learned a lot this season and that he is extremely proud of his players for their ability to fight through all of the ups and downs and remained committed.
“They have been such a joy to be around,” Dawkins said. “The main thing I have learned is you think about life and sometimes you see things in life and in the news and in the newspaper and there is a lot of negativity out there. It gets to you sometimes. But what makes it worthwhile is practicing and seeing the young people. That makes it go away. If you ever have been around young people, they make me think everything is just going to be fine.
“Me being around these guys makes my life worthwhile. It makes me feel better about the future.”
Follow Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino on Twitter @ctsportseditor
Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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