Five minutes before kickoff of their game against Scecina Memorial, Brebeuf head football coach Matt Geske was in his team’s locker room, sixty-six helmeted warriors standing and kneeling all around him, waiting for their coach’s inspirational pregame pep talk. And Geske wanted to talk about bad college football. “How many of you guys saw Rutgers – UMass last night?” the coach asked, in reference to to the New Jersey Big Ten school’s vomitous 37-21 home upset loss to a UMass team that had gone winless the season before and had entered the game as 29-point underdogs. It was a great analogy to remind the Braves of, as they were about to take the field to play an overmatched Scecina team with only 24 players, on a night when kickoffs around the state were delayed due to high-90’s temperatures, thus compounding the Crusaders’ potential for misery. Unlike Brebeuf, most of Scecina’s players would have to play both ways. If there was point spread wagering on high school football in Indiana (there isn’t, thank God, but check back in a few years) Brebeuf would have been about a 35 point favorite over Scecina. But good teams take care of business against teams they should roll up, and Geske didn’t want his guys to let their foot off the gas until he told them to. Box checked. Brebeuf scored touchdowns on their first six drives to race to a 42-0 second quarter lead, at which time Geske’s staff subbed the starters, and got his JVs and freshmen some good Friday Night playing time. Twelve Brebeuf players rushed, threw or caught the football, while 23 Braves recorded tackles. The final score was 49-7, but it could literally have been any number Geske and his team chose, as this game kicking off Labor Day weekend became a little, well, laborious to watch. (And with everybody on both sidelines dripping wet from the high humidity, the game kind of had the vibe of a Labor Day pool party, only with refs.) Taking nothing away from the flashy offensive standouts of this night, such as QB Keegan Bouwkamp’s pair of TD passes to Zeb Cox, or Jasir King and Jayden Warren’s two shiny TD rushes each, it was Brebeuf’s defense that ruled the evening like Teamsters at a Labor Day political rally, allowing only 111 total yards, with ten tackles-for-loss and three takeaways. And not just any takeaways, but flashy, SportsCenter-esque takeaways: two interceptions with long returns by juniors Brady Allen (65 yards) and Connor Sweet (35 yards), and a 40-yard scoop-and-score fumble return TD by freshman Henry Wells. Speaking of freshmen, Connor Bonnell may be the next of a long lineage of excellent Brebeuf placekickers, with each of his kicks seeming to get a little stronger than the last. Bonnell punted while splitting kickoff and PAT duties with senior Miles Wilmore, and seems to have the stronger leg of the two. With three more years of developing under Special Teams coach Joel Clem’s careful tutelage, Bonnell could become a real weapon. Brebeuf moves emphatically to 2-1, a far cry from the 0-6 Shakespearean tragedy of last season, and with the appetizer portion of the season complete, it’s time to eat the elephant: three straight games against Circle City Conference opponents- at Guerin, then home against Chatard and Roncalli. Three teams that defeated Brebeuf by a combined score of 118-38 last season. For seniors like Carter Cosgrove, Krystian Oakley, Brayden Neese, Nate Johnson, Eli Drake and Cam Walters, these next three weeks are a chance to leave a legacy: the one-year rebuild. For Zionsville transfer Bouwkamp, this is why he came to Brebeuf- for the opportunity to throw darts into the secondaries of some of the best Catholic school football powerhouses in the Midwest. A week one injury kept him from those games last season, so you know he’ll be looking to make his bones. Show up for your football team these next three weeks, Brebeuf fans. This team can score from anywhere on the field, and they deserve full-throated fan support as they begin the historic gauntlet of their final Circle City Conference season. There’s not a better way to spend ten bucks than IHSAA Football (except maybe taking Rutgers’ next eleven opponents plus the points.) Go Braves!