Fall Sports Preview: Triton Trojans Football
BOURBON – As if summer vacation wasn’t hectic enough. Vacation took on multiple meanings in July for the Triton football program. And thus has created minor chaos as the team scrambles to organize itself ahead of a fast-approaching season.
While most of the school staff, including athletic director Mason McIntyre, were away enjoying a few weeks of quiet time with family, former Triton football coach John Johns decided to also take some time away. Permanently. Johns resigned from his head coaching post while McIntyre was in the midst of a family vacation in South Carolina, leaving a football program without a leader.
Scrambling to find someone to run the program, Ron Brown stepped forward. The co-wrestling coach had helped the football program as an assistant so the transition wouldn’t be as difficult. But with his third child on the way in September and the wrestling program also under his watch, the adjustment will be an enormous one.
“I wasn’t even planning on coaching to be honest,” Brown said eluding to the impending birth on the way. “Our staff was put together (July 31).
Brown tabbed several familiar faces to his staff, including former Trojan football head coach Rodney Younis, as well as his co-wrestling sidekick, Matt Arvesen.
Getting the kids on board, however, was a new challenge. Brown noted as of his first week of workouts, the team fielded two seniors, but since has added 10 more to boast of a much healthier roster.
Among those whom should impact on the field are senior Jeremy Jones, who rushed for 870 yards and scored nine touchdowns along with playing a solid linebacker. Senior Gage Waddle will be relied upon to shore up the defense with Jones. Sophomore Lee Mullet will return at linebacker, junior Malachi Greene will help on both sides of the ball and senior Jordan Anderson will add speed on the offense in his first year of football.
“We don’t have the depth that some of the other teams have, but we have a lot of excitement,” Brown said. “We have a lot of kids that are above average, and add in some skill, and a lot of good things can happen.”
Triton’s move into the Hoosier North Athletic Conference will see some of the state’s premier teams like New Prairie and Jimtown move off Triton’s schedule as they are now in the Northern Indiana Conference. But the HNAC will not be a cakewalk as Class 1-A state runner-up Pioneer and perennial 1-A power Winamac join in. Winamac has lost two games in the past two seasons and Pioneer lost the state final by one point.
Bremen stays on as the lone non-conference team on Triton’s schedule, slated for week four, and West Central, Caston and North Judson become conference games to go with old foes LaVille, Knox and Culver.
“Yeah, the schedule will be tough but it really isn’t that much of an upgrade because you take Pioneer and Winamac and swap them in for Jimtown and New Prairie, which are much bigger and deeper programs,” Brown said. “I feel like, man to man, we should be a lot closer to the teams in our conference now. I feel the student body feels that way about all of our sports, especially football.”
Triton opens play Aug. 21 at home against Caston, a team Triton is 7-3 against the past 10 years.