Huskerland Prep features Blue Hill Football player

One on One with Huskerland Prep Report

This Sharp has an Edge

Playing with a sense of purpose, Blue Hill Senior Garrett Sharp is a leader of a close knit team.

By Walter Villa
HPR senior contributor

Wvilla07@yahoo.com Blue Hill running back and inside line backer Garrett Sharp said he felt this Bobcats team was already close but now, due to a tragedy, they’re even closer.

 

On Sept. 5, four people - including Blue Hill students Dustin Tesdahl and Caroline Thallman - died after a school bus and a tractor trailer collided. The crash also claimed the lives of both drivers, Marla Wentworth and Travis Witte.
Sharp said he and Tesdahl were “best buddies” and added that the Bobcats have dedicated their season to the accident victims.
“After what happened,” Sharp said, “like guys on the team have a lot more respect for each other.”

In honor of the four lives lost, Bobcat players are wearing a sticker on their helmets with four crosses.
Two days after the tragedy, the Bobcats played Doniphan-Trumbull and with heavy hearts, defeated the Cardinals, 28-18.
The Bobcats (6-1) haven’t lost since, reeling off six straight wins over all, leading Coach Scott Porter to believe that this might be a special team - perhaps even as good as his 2008 group that won a class C-2 state championship.
Porter said his 2010 and 2011 teams lacked senior leadership. But this years group, led by Sharp is different.
“Garrett’s work ethic in the classroom and on the field is what you wish you had every year, “ Porter said. “The kids all respect him.””
Porter gave an example of their respect from this past off-season.
“It was the last of our two-a-days practices and we were giving the players time off because of how hard they had worked,” Porter said. “Garrett called a team meeting and the next thing you know, he had them on the line, and they’re all running sprints.”
Sharp, a 5-11 180 lb senior who wants to study agriculture in college is a third-year starter at linebacker and a second year starter at running back. He agrees with Porter that the senior leadership had slipped the past two years.
In fact Sharp said he and his classmates started noticing that as freshmen.
“When we got to be seniors, “ Sharp said, “we wanted to create a brotherhood and not have separate groups. We wanted to play as one.”
In that spirit Sharp is quick to credit his blockers for freeing him for 781 yards, a 7.1 average and three touch downs this season.
He also has 56 tackles, including 43 solos, to go with one interception and one fumble on defense.
Last week, though, Sharp missed the Bobcats 36-7 win over Superior due to an MCL strain in his left knee.
He suffered the injury in the first quarter of the previous game. Against Centura, when a defender slammed his shoulder pads into Sharp’s knee.
My foot was planted and my leg was locked. Sharp said. “ I popped right back up, but I could feel my knee was tingling. I thought it was a stinger, so I tried to walk it off.”
Porter said Blue Hill missed Sharp’s leadership last week but were grateful that other players emerged.
That has been a theme all season for the Bobcats who returned only three defensive starters from last season. The offensive line, which lost four starters, also had to rebuild.
Complicating matters even more, Porter switched the offense from an I-formation to a spread attack, in part to better utilize Sharp, who had played fullback the previous year.
The receivers, “ Porter said, half-jokingly “are the happiest they’ve ever been here.”
Porter, a former offensive lineman, said he has always been partial to power football. But this is the first time he has had a 1,000 yard passer and he is enjoying how his team’s new-found balance is putting additional pressure on defenses.
“Overall, this has been a fantastic year, “ Porter said. “The way the kids are coming together has been huge. We couldn’t have asked for a better group of kids.”