SUAMICO (NBC 26) — It’s hard to have a better start to a head coaching tenure than Steven Jorgensen at Bay Port high school.
In his two seasons, he led the Pirates to a gold and silver ball down in Madison.
“It's amazing playing 28 games over the course of two seasons, but we got a great administration and players and coaches and what a ride it was those two seasons, and we're just looking to build on it this year,” Jorgensen noted.
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This year, the Bay Port has to replace quarterback Matt Stevens, a two-year who will be playing football at Northern Michigan University this season. Stevens completed almost 69% of his passes for 2,116 yards, 23 touchdowns and just four interceptions last year. He also rushed for 1,002 yards.
“You don't replace Matt Stevens. He left his legacy. He's a legend here in this program, but we reload and we got two quarterbacks, (juniors) Bray Babich and Braydon Maney competing for the spot. We believe in competition here and we got great competition going on right now, not just at quarterback, but all throughout our roster,” the head coach explained.
As the old saying goes, if you have two quarterbacks, you don’t have one. For Jorgensen, he says that’s absolutely not the case.
“We got two really, really good quarterbacks and they make each other better. They compete together and they work hard together and we got competition throughout this roster, like I said, and a lot of players working to get on the field,” Jorgensen emphasized.
His squad not only has to fill the giant shoes left behind by Stevens, but also running back Brady Moon, who was one of the best running backs in Wisconsin. Moon rushed for 2,198 yards, averaging 8.1 yards per carry and punched in 31 touchdowns on the ground. He was also dynamic in the passing game with 9 touchdown receptions.
However, Jorgensen says they have many playmakers who can help fill the void.
“(Senior) Jackson Otradovec is a 3 year starter for us. He's going to be all over the field for us on offense. He's a Lightning type player. (Senior) Ryder Timmerman and (junior) Jackson Smith are our duo. We call them Thunder and Lightning in the backfield, and we've got about 6 wideouts that can really play and some tight ends and fullbacks that can do things with the ball also. So we've got some weapons,” he added.
Despite all the changes, the standard for the program will always be making it to the Division 1 state title game.
“That's the standard here. We, we believe that we got the best players, the best coaches, and we believe that we got the best process and then we're not trying to be arrogant about that, but we just believe in the process that it's going to lead to a high level of execution and that's what we're working for every single day, try to be connected, have fun. It's a blessing to play this game and we're excited to get out there and execute,” Jorgensen concluded.
