Learning curve: ODA

SARASOTA — The Out-of-Door Academy football team won before it even stepped out onto the field.
The Thunder, a team comprised primarily of freshmen, accomplished a feat from which many would have shied away.

The players stepped off the bus, suited up and walked united into Tornado Alley.

Sure, they had their reservations.

After all, they were a small Class 3A school facing a Class 5A school hoping to return to prominence.
They had been outscored 81-16 in their first two games.

They had lost the majority of their senior leadership to injury, and, in the days leading up to their non-district game at Booker, the Thunder lost both of its quarterbacks — junior Jimmy Kuebler left to focus on baseball, and freshman Nate Strawderman transferred to Lakewood Ranch.

Two other reserve quarterbacks were out with injury, forcing ODA to turn the ball over to its No. 5 quarterback, senior wide receiver and defensive back Jeremy Herrin, who is playing football for the first time this season.

Facing more adversity in three weeks than most teams face in an entire season, the Thunder easily could have disbanded.

Instead, ODA focused on what it could control: to never give up.

The end result was another lopsided loss. This time, it was a 55-0 shutout.

But, for a team that hung with Booker for the first couple of series, it showed perseverance. It showed tenacity. And it showed a willingness and drive to overcome.

“I told them before we stepped out on this field that, ‘You’re winners,’” coach Brett Timmons says. “‘Everything in your surroundings will tell you to quit and stop, but you came out here and you competed. No matter what the scoreboard says, you conquered your fear. You conquered adversity. You looked adversity in the face, and you stared it down.’”

ODA knew it was going to face its fair share of challenges this season with 16 of its 32 players being freshmen. But, that was before the Thunder lost seven of its starters, leaving the Thunder with 16 freshmen, three sophomores and three seniors who are healthy enough to play. As a result, ODA has been forced to forgo its freshmen football season this year.

And the ODA coaching staff has transitioned its focus to using this season as a learning opportunity.

“This is a glorified freshmen football season for us,” Timmons says. “It’s actually a 10-week spring football season for us in the sense that we’re using this opportunity to develop, to grow, to understand the speed of the game.

“By playing against teams such as Booker, Cardinal Mooney and Bishop Verot, now as freshmen they understand what it takes,” Timmons says. “The risk is having such lopsided losses that the kids would get despondent about it, but that’s our job as coaches to always point out the positive side.”

With seven games remaining, the Thunder is seeking to build on the previous week’s achievements — ones that didn’t necessarily make it into the box score.

The hope is that by going up against players who are stronger, faster and have been in their respective programs for the past two or three years, that ODA will learn what it takes to compete at the varsity level and be better for it in the end.

And, so far, the Thunder is buying in.

“I’m very pleasantly pleased and surprised at what my guys have responded,” Timmons says.