Before the mass exodus westward of the Orlando Metro area came to pass, there was one community that stood alone amongst the rolling hills and orange groves bucked-up against the southeast corner of Lake Apopka. Attending West Orange High School in the 90’s or early 00’s, you were the equivalent of attending Durant, Newsome or East Bay; cut-off from the hustle-and-bustle of the city, yet the county was the same as the urbanites you played against.
If you wanted a “better” chance perhaps during the last decade, your best option was to head just up the road northeast towards Apopka, or slightly southwest towards Dr. Phillips. Certainly a chance worth taking, but a tall order given the amount of talent already placed on those rosters. Until last season, it was 1999 since the West Orange Warriors had even made the playoffs let alone command “must-stop” status from college coaches on the recruiting trail.
Things change in a hurry. A 9-2 season and a laundry list of prospects and commits can do that. A wide receiver committing to Kentucky and a QB to BYU can do that. Now their roster contains a couple of Top 100 prospects in Florida (RB Dexter Williams 6-1, 190lbs; a Miami verbal commit; and ATH Jalen Julius 6-0, 170lbs) along with two WR’s ready for breakouts (Rontavious Williams & Eddie McDoom); and a defensive end Brandon Wilson (6-4,236lbs) that holds BCS offers.
Enter into the picture Wilson’s teammate on the opposite of the line, who is now poised to pick up where the QB from BYU left off; got all that? Good, because when you see the smoke rising from scoreboards towards the east on Friday’s it will be in large part to Gunnar Ballant, the 6-3, 202lb pass-rusher now converted to pass-thrower.
Ballant showed the part last week at BCP’s ‘The Standard’ in Orlando and had everyone thinking he played the position from the very beginning. It would seem that the cardinal rules and skill-set of playing the DE position would turn around and make him just a work-in-progress on the surface, but his ability to use his feet, hips and hands along WITH that size and strength is what must have his coaches at West Orange feeling like they won’t miss a beat.
“We’ll probably average more [than we did last year] with all the weapons we have coming back on offense,” says Ballant with what sounded like a smile accompanied by it. “Truthfully I had a LITTLE Bit of an idea I was going to play QB. In practice last year I would always go in one play here or a play there; then in the offseason I got with our offensive coordinator and we started getting into training and getting right for this year. “
Averaging 45 points a game and managing that kind of talent can be stressful though. It takes an individual that is cut from a similar, but different cloth to be able to step-in and simply keep the momentum. Some call it naive or even a little arrogant, but with Ballant it isn’t a stretch at all to think that this is a matter of confidence even if the opportunity to fail exists.
“It definitely makes it easier when you have guys like that around. You’ve got a running back you can hand the ball off to a couple of times and that can lead to points at any moment, if I’m having a slow start I can throw quick screens to Eddie and Jalen which can turn into 80yds and a TD first-play, things get much easier for me at that point.”
Winning their district will require beating Apopka, Olympia and Evans. They will also have to face an upgraded Boone team in their opener, and get offensive machine Oak Ridge in week three. Given a chance to look ahead, Ballant’s not buying what I’m selling with the question regarding any of those opponents, although he was kind enough to answer it anyways.
“We’ve got a first-class opponent in the preseason classic at Columbia (Lake City) to get ready to play against. We’re not really looking ahead to Apopka; we’ve got to beat the likes of Boone and Oak Ridge first and although we beat Boone pretty good to start last season, they’ve got some guys that I’ve seen from the 7-on-7 season that are pretty good, and Oak Ridge scored a bunch of points on us and they’ve got talent all over the field.”
So the premise for Ballant and his teammates is pretty clear, but where is the perspective? The young man gives all the credit to said teammates along with his coaches and his father.
“Honestly the best advice I’ve been given is you just got to go out there and put in hard work day in and day out. Of course you want a winning season and all, and you want offers, but I mean you’ve got a team to worry about before yourself. You just kind of block it out and go about the season. If we win, offers will come. That’s pretty much how it works. I think you just go out there and do what you have to do and things will fall in line.”
– Doug Pugh