The CHIEF September 2024

Football Update By Ben Melchers

The 2024 Varsity Pontiac football team started their season 0-3, losing to Bloomington Central Catholic, the Prairie Central Hawks, and the Rantoul Eagles. Even though the season isn’t turning out the way they wanted to start it, the team has been working hard since the end of February, whether they've been in the weight room over the off season or getting work in as teammates on their own time. Pontiac just played their recent game against the Rantoul Eagles, losing 21-15. The team had four key players that couldn’t participate in that game against the Eagles, including star receiver Amazin King and starting quarterback AJ Delong. Also on the injured list is Santi Piña who is an all-conference defensive end and starts right tackle, and Trenton Blackwell, another all-conference player who plays defensive tackle and starts left tackle. With all of those key players injured, the team could only go forward from there, and that means that backups have to step up. It was a lot of pressure for sophomore quarterback Joshua Hartke to play starting quarterback and try to lead Pontiac to a win against the Eagles. But Josh wasn’t scared of that opportunity because even though the game didn’t go the way he and his team wanted to, he stepped up as a sophomore and led the team to a very close loss. Overall, the team is going to keep working hard, and the coaching staff will keep on challenging the players to get better. The next game will be on September 20th against the Paxton-Buckley-Loda Panthers.