The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
Team wins national flag football title
A Lorain flag football team with a roster sprinkled with former local high school football and basketball standouts won a United Flag Football League national championship earlier this month in a tournament played in Orlando.
The NEO Monstars went a perfect 6-0 in the tournament to walk away with the Flag Football Division III 8-on-8 title.
Many of the team’s players have been together for a decade and have chased a ring that entire time, said Eduardo “Jun” Rios, who is the team’s owner.
Area high school sports fans are familiar with some of the team’s standouts.
That list includes quarterback Scott Remaklus, who was a star basketball player at Southview in the early 2000s, and receiver Eddie Williamson, who was a quarterback and point guard at Lorain High and played on the memorable 2015 Titan basketball squad that electrified the community with its winning ways.
Remaklus and Williamson were named offensive co-MVPs.
Williamson scored 10 touchdowns in the six games.
Other members included Perry Mincy, who played at Lorain High, and Dejaun Glover, a 2013 Elyria graduate who was an All-District receiver with the Pioneers.
Glover and Mincy were named defensive co-MVPs for a unit that registered 20 sacks and 10 interceptions in six games.
The Monstars clinched the title with a 27-24 overtime win Jan. 18 over the Chicago-based Vanilla Gorillas.
Zachary Block, of Florida, who kicked collegiately at Tulane University, nailed the game-winning field goal.
Rios picked up Block to handle the team’s kicking duties after they arrived in the sunshine state.
“It was a whole team effort,” Rios said.
The Monstars emerged from a field of 31 teams to win their division.
“There are guys that won this title that have been waiting 10 years,” Rios said. “There were emotions. People were crying.”
Flag football provides a competitive outlet for former high school and college athletes to continue playing after their tackle football career ends, he said.
“After you are done playing in high school or college, flag is the new thing,” Rios said. “We played in a bracket with teams from all over.
“We beat three teams from Washington, D.C., and three from Chicago, but they were from all over.”
The season is a long one, Rios said.
The Monstars began playing games in March 2021 to qualify for a trip to the 2022 national championships.
Teams rack up points during the season based on wins and those point totals determine which squads qualify for nationals.
“We are a veteran team; we are a well-oiled machine,” Rios said. “When we are on that football field, we are clicking on all cylinders.”
The roster includes players from Vermilion and Cleveland, as well as Lorain and Elyria.
And while some of the teams the Monstars faced had players who played Division I and Division II college football, and even some pro football, Rios’ roster featured guys with far less imposing post-high school football resumes.
“That’s the crazy part about our team, we’re a mosh-pit of players who don’t have D-1 experience,” he said. “But at the same time, we’re competing with D-1 and D-2 college athletes or ex-professional players.”