Canton McKinley mentor looks back on season with optimism
By Keno Sultan
C-Town Radio announcer and statistician
CANTON--There has never been any surrender or quit in a Canton McKinley Bulldog when Antonio Hall was a three-year varsity starter from 1997-1999.
There wasn't any surrender or quit in the 2023 Canton McKinley Bulldogs under his watch as head coach.
The Bulldogs improved their win total by three wins this year and exceeded the eight wins from 2021 as the team concluded their season with a respectable 9-4 record by advancing to the regional semifinals for a second straight season and also an outright Federal League title to their testament. Along the way, the team went on a six-game winning streak spanning the second week of the season up to the ninth week and found a way to capture two playoff wins after ending the regular season with losses to GlenOak and Massillon.
In addition to that, McKinley won their first opening game in three years with a 33-14 win over Warren Harding, survived a broken down bus on the road to neutralize Dublin Coffman and overcame a 20-point halftime chasm to stop Green, who at press time faces Massillon Friday in a Division II regional final at North Canton Memorial Stadium.
Through it all, Hall was very pleased with the fight in his team, something he prided himself on during the watchful eyes of Thom McDaniels and Kerry Hodakievic.
"Our guys demonstrated a lot of fight through every up and down especially in the playoffs and that is what I was proud of the most," he said.
Last week, the Bulldogs season concluded with a 41-17 loss to two-time defending Division I state king Lakewood St. Edward. For a quarter, McKinley battled the Eagles evenly but saw their bid for a quality victory ravaged by a 21-point second quarter from the Eagles, whose experience in big games under ninth-year Eagles head coach Tom Lombardo proved vital in the school's fourth ever meeting at Byers Field in Parma.
It was key turnovers and missed opportunities that poisoned McKinley's chance at a seismic upset. When asked if last week's setback was a carbon copy of a 42-0 regional semifinal loss two years earlier at the same venue, Hall did not view it as such.
"That second quarter was huge for them. St. Edward moved the ball well and we hacd costly turnovers and batted down balls and you can't have those. But this game was much better than the first time as we were a different team this year than from two years earlier," he said.
Offensively, McKinley aside from a six-turnover affair against Green took adept care of the football as evidenced by their 24 points averaged on the season while averaging 28.3 in league competition.
The previous season, it was Keaton Rode and Amarion Williams that split time at quarterback. With Williams graduating, Rode became the full-time starter and captained an offense that featured speedy receivers Keith Quincy and Dante McClellan along with running backs Nino Hill and Stephon Thomas, who filled in admirably for Hill when the primary back sat out the Dublin Coffman contest due to a private matter.
Defensively, the Bulldogs were not bad either. They only yielded 20 points overall and just 16 in league competition. Playmakers such as Dior Garner, Shaukeer Hatcher and Ja'Diss Jackson were vital in them being an attacking defense that was capable of constructing turnovers and changing the trajectory of contests in terms of field position.
"We had a lot of ups offensively and we challenged everyone to get involved and everyone was in a rhythm and it was our job to do what we could do to create momentum. And defensively, we had guys at 100 tackles and nine players got between 70 and 90 tackles. It was a team effort. Our front seven in the box played well and our secondary was strong this year," Hall said.
As of right now, McKinley does not have any seniors who have committed to any university to continue their academic or athletic career. 23 seniors will close the book on their McKinley careers with two Federal League championships to their testament and winners of 28 contests in a four-year span.
They were sophomores when a scandal caused nearly the entire upheaval of the previous football coaching staff along with 22 players transferring to other area schools. The credibility of the McKinley football program was on the verge of a disastrous end two years ago when the team suffered two thunderous home losses and were in danger of a third straight loss on the road before recovering to win six of their last eight contests that changed the course of the direction contrary to where it was headed.
If not for a win over an undefeated Huber Heights Wayne two years earlier in what was a true crossroads contest, who knows where the McKinley program may have ended up not just in 2022 but this year and likely for the future.
With McKinley now joining 392 other Ohio teams in the 30-day no-contact state mandated period before offseason conditioning commences for them on December 11, Hall knows that his juniors will get one more chance to put on a Bulldogs jersey and the sophomores will have two more chances while the freshmen will get three more chances.
"I want the returning players to reflect on what we accomplished. Obviously it's not fun losing when you have turnovers, missed assignments and self-inflicted opportunities. We want them to reflect on those and then come back better for next season," Hall said.
There was never any surrender or quit in Antonio Hall when he starred as a three-year starter for Canton McKinley. That fact remained the same and defined the 2023 edition of the Canton McKinley Bulldogs.
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