WASHINTON TOWNSHIP — In the spring of 2017 North Central made the decision to swoop Kevin O’Shea away from Lafayette Central Catholic and they struck gold. The coach I like to call Chinchilla O’Shea has the program back in business. I call him Chinchilla because he’s got enough swag to wear a chinchilla hat and coat on the sideline and get away with it if he wanted to. After a 3-7 record in his first season with the Panthers. They hit the ground running in 2018 and finished the year 9-3 with a sectional championship under their belts.
They gave the eventual Class 6A state champs, Warren Central, all they could handle in the regional eventually losing 42-32. Now it’s that time of year again and Coach O’Shea has a confident group of men ready to take it to the next level.
When asked what made the difference from year one, to year two, with his team he had this to say, “In the first season we got a couple of wins early and got a little bit of a taste of it. We just weren’t quite ready for that conference schedule just yet. We competed but we did not play to a potential championship level. That set the table for the following year. The kids kinda got it. We had more bodies at practice…we had more buy in from everybody and I think we had great senior leadership. That carried us and when you get a couple wins early things can snow ball and confidence can grow.”
He goes on to say about this season, “I see better! Um…I guess what I’m looking for is…now I think they’ve got confidence in their teammates and they’re confident in the people around them. Now I would like to see our kids get more confident individually. I would like to see guys coming in here understanding what they’re supposed to do, when their supposed to do it, and how they’re supposed to do it and we’re closer to that. It still takes some time. The young guys don’t quite get it yet, the older guys do. When I see the older guys coaching the younger guys then I’ll be happy.”
North Central has 13 returning starters from it’s Sectional Championship team from a year ago and they’ll be relying heavily on their defense early on. They graduated an All-State quarterback, an All-State receiver and two offensive lineman with one of them making the all-star team. That’s a lot to lose on one side of the ball.
However, they’ve got some studs on defense ready to carry them. O’Shea will be looking to senior Mike Brown who was the second leading tackler in the conference a year ago. He’s a three year starter with three D1 offers on the table. He’s the real deal that the Panthers are willing to follow into battle. In addition to Mike they’ve got both corners back in juniors, Theran Johnson and Deshon Hunter. They’re crazy athletic and can cover like a blanket. Grant Russell moves from inside backer to outside backer. Then there’s Cam Brown on the defensive line ready to move some furniture in 2019.
I don’t know about you but I’m excited to see this North Central team take it to new heights in 2019. Kevin O’Shea’s got the right type of swag to get it done too.
He won 5 Class A state titles in a matter of 9 years at Lafayette Central Catholic. So you already knew that it would just be a matter of time before he turned this once powerful program around. Year three should be fun to watch. In my Terrell Owens voice, “Get Ya Popcorn Ready!” Stop me when I start lyin’!