CLARK, NJ- Through their first five games of the season, the Arthur L. Johnson High School Crusaders have continued to greatly excel while on the running game during their offensive drives. They have put up 2,236 yards on the ground with 227 carries, to go along with 21 rushing touchdowns. They’ve also come up handy in this to milk the clock and go about with great clock management.
Those wins have captured accolades for the team that include being the 2017 UNICO Bowl Champions, along with being the 2017 Mid-State 38 Valley Division Conference Champions, the program’s first conference championship since the 2006 season.
However, the success of the running game would not be possible at all if it wasn’t for the Johnson Crusaders offensive line, who has withstood physical defensive fronts of other teams.
“We just go out there and have an amazing game plan [with] Coach DelConte and Coach Zub,” senior Eddie Weingartner said. “Coach Zub is always pushing us everyday and our co-captain Tommy Bowen keeps us going hard all week at practice.”
“Tommy is a great tight end that keeps us going no matter how tough the opposition is,” he added.
As stated in “The Blind Side,” the offensive lineman protects the quarterback’s blind spot whenever he looks to make a pass to a receiver. The same concept, in a way, can be used here to describe the work the offensive linemen have to put in every game.
Composed of sophomore Patrick Brennan, senior Dan Olenick, junior Luke Giltner, seniors James Greenbush and Eddie Weingartner and junior Rico Veltre, allowed all the rushing plays to cash in and allow the Crusaders to score the points they have on the season. The practices put the guys hard at work, to not only help the running game, but to give the team chances to win a football game.
“It’s really all about the basics,” Glitner said. “We all just try to stick to our assignments and remember the fundamentals.”
They’ve left their mark on the games they’ve played so far, especially the go-ahead touchdown scored in their 23-13 Week 3 win over the Roselle-Abraham Clark Rams, including a physical Hillside defensive front that allowed the plays to be made in their 22-13 Week 5 win.
If they don’t fight the Roselle defensive front, not just on the drive that led to Kevin Metz’s go-ahead touchdown, or Joe Turek’s that sealed the game, they probably do not become wins for the Crusaders. Communication and coming together as a team are the qualities heavily preached by the coaches to the players.
“The biggest thing I’ve seen from the summer to now is how as a unit every week and every practice, they are coming together and are just communicating as well as trusting each other more and more,” Johnson assistant coach Andrew Zub said. “We’ve just been constantly working on it for months are starting to see major improvement.”
Zub, a 2013 ALJ graduate joined the coaching staff this past season and is coaching the offensive and defensive lines. He also spoke of his first coaching job and what he’s continued to learn as he began his next chapter in football, after playing four years at the collegiate level at King’s College.
“It is big to just instill a mentality and mindset of trying to be the best unit out there with us being the biggest group on the field in size and numbers-wise,” Zub said. “We have five of the 11 players on offense and if you want to be technical, everybody on this offense has to do their part of run/pass blocking to make us successful.”
“As a whole from the offensive line to the A-backs/splits and tights, we are improving and progressing every week, which is awesome to witness,” he added. “We just try to put them in the position to succeed and they are the ones who have to execute. They have been doing a good job, but there’s always room to improve and things to fix.”
A few members spent some time talking about the daily preparations during the weekly practices of how they prepare for the upcoming games on the schedule.
“Practices consist of a lot of sled work, working on blocking techniques and countless reps of plays,” Greenbush said. “We push each other all practice and can’t wait to get out on the field to practice each day.”
While they may not receive recognition for the statistics and plays on offense, it’s the work and protection they provide for the offense that allows the team to get into a position to win a football game.
“The biggest thing I’ve noticed from my perspective watching the other coaches and learning from them as well as my own personal philosophy is to just be consistent with their approach and keeping the guys focused during the week, as well as games,” Zub said. “We look at it as an advantage or edge that we stick to the plan and trust in each other from top to bottom.”
“I’m so proud of what these guys have done so far and how they have progressed, but this isn’t the final product. We [have to keep] improving and wanting to peak at the right time.”
The major moments include when the defense gets into a formation to blitz the quarterback, a situation which puts the guys to work to make the necessary steps to get to the right spots.
“Depending on where the blitz is, we would usually just end up down blocking,” Veltre said.
With three more games on the schedule, the offensive line remains heading back to work, keeping the offense strudy and working hard every day, just like Michael Oher does for the quarterback, as talked about on, “The Blind Side.”
