The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
Kirtland’s defense shines heading into showdown
If you didn’t know better, you would get the idea that Kirtland football coach Tiger LaVerde is a tough guy to please.
LaVerde’s Hornets had just put the finishing touches on a 55-0 win over host Fairport on Oct. 12 when he was asked about the performance this year of his defensive unit.
“The kids play hard. They get after it,” he said. “If everybody does their job, we’ve got a shot to be decent on defense.” Decent? It’s safe to say the Kirtland football team has been decent on defense this year. And then some. With its win over Fairport, Kirtland posted its fifth shutout over a seven-game span.
For the season, the Hornets have outscored the opposition, 352-48.
On top of that, it wasn’t until Fairport quarterback Sammy Schuster ripped off a 25-yard run late in the first half that Kirtland finally surrendered its 1,000th yard of the season.
A span of 358 minutes, 33 seconds of clock time elapsed before the eighth team on Kirtland’s schedule finally put the Hornets’ defensive aggregate over 1,000 yards of the season? Decent? Any coach on any level would take that definition of “decent” defense.
“Defense is what wins championships,” said junior defensive back Joey Torok. “You can score all the points you want, but if you give up even more, you can’t win.
“Defense is what we focus on here. It’s 100 percent of why we’ve been successful.”
Ask anyone around the area — around the state, for that matter — what sticks out in their mind regarding Kirtland’s recent run of greatness that includes state championships in 2011, 2013 and 2015 and the topic of the Hornets’ bludgeoning Stack-I offense that grinds opposing defenses into the dirt will be the common answer. Not so, says LaVerde. It’s the defense — quick, physically strong, mentally sharp — that is why the Hornets have been so successful.
And that defense will be the reason Kirtland is successful in the postseason this year, if it is meant to be.
Players like Dominic Capretta, who picked off his fifth pass of the season against the Skippers.
Like Louie Loncar, the youngest of three Loncar boys (following Ryan and Owen) who have starred on Kirtland’s defenses over the years.
Like lineman Brett Diemer, younger brother of former star Dylan Diemer, and linebacker Ethan Jernejic, cousin to former Kirtland standout Ben Madden and Bears quarterback Mitchell Trubisky.
The players getting yards are not who have made Kirtland great.
It’s the players stopping others from getting yards.
“Our defense, we give up less than 10 points per game,” Capretta said. “Coach Beeler, our (defensive) coach, coaches us well.”
Defensive coordinator Ryan Beeler might be one of the most unsung assistant coaches in the area, if not Ohio.
Much credit for Kirtland’s defensive success goes to Beeler’s tutelage.
The recipe for success is semi-simple at Kirtland. Prepare hard in the offseason, practice hard every day, be mentally sharp and play relentlessly.
The Kirtland defense smothers the opposition and gives the ball to the punishing offense, which figuratively takes the field and swings sledge hammers until they reach the end zone. Then repeat. Over and over again.
“We have great practices,” LaVerde said. “We go best against best in practice. It can get pretty competitive and pretty feisty.”
But the results are seen on Friday nights.
To be honest, the Hornets’ last handful of games hasn’t presented much of a test. That’s nothing against the rest of the CVC Valley, but more so a credit to where Kirtland is as a program.
The biggest test comes next week — an Oct. 20 showdown at Cuyahoga Heights, a team that beat the Hornets twice last year — once in the regular season and once in the playoffs.
Kirtland was shut out both times, 21-0 and 17-0. Defense matters. Cuyahoga Heights proved that last year.
“We’ve been waiting for this one since last year,” Torok said. “We lost to them twice. We’ve definitely had this one circled for a while.”
LaVerde rattled off the characteristics of what a player needs to be to be successful in his team’s defense, from the mental sharpness that cuts down on mistakes to the physical training that is honed in the offseason to the relentless effort between the white lines.
It has been seen all season long, and it will be necessary if the Hornets next week are to avenge their two losses to Coach Al Martin’s Redskins.
“Our defense is why we’ve been playing so deep in the playoffs for many years,” LaVerde said. “We have to be able to get off the field. Everybody knows defense wins championships.”
Even the “decent” ones.
Kampf can be reached via email at JKampf@NewsHerald.com; On Twitter @NHPreps