Taylorville football is off to 3-1 start with this junior QB righting the ship
TAYLORVILLE — Junior quarterback Baron Odam hopes to resurrect the Taylorville football team’s past success.
It wasn’t that long ago the Tornadoes wreaked havoc in the Apollo Conference and assembled seven straight playoff appearances from 2013 until 2019.
Odam’s cousin, Brandon, starred as an all-state QB during that stretch and catapulted Taylorville to the Class 4A state quarterfinals in 2018.
Odam has these Tornadoes (3-1 overall, 0-1 Apollo) on the right trajectory in his second season running the offense even despite a 28-6 home loss to Mount Zion in Friday’s conference opener.
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The defense ruffled a dynamic offense with three turnovers while the team has already chalked up more wins than last season’s 2-7 mark.
“We had a bunch of sophomores last year, and now we're all stacked up with juniors and seniors,” Odam said.
A playmaker on both sides
Odam, who also starts on defense, came up with one of those turnovers. He stripped the ball from Mount Zion’s Brayden Trimble early in the second quarter before throwing a 9-yard touchdown pass to Cash Foraker for a 7-6 deficit.
Trimble, a 6-foot-2 junior, has a couple of NCAA Division I offers from Miami Ohio and Northwestern.
“I saw him (QB Makobi Adams) throw the ball, and it was behind him, so I was thinking he wasn't going to catch it and it was maybe going to be a fumble,” Baron said of the play. “I just ran up as fast as I could, and it popped into my hands.”
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Odam ended up going 6-for-11 for 55 yards with one pick on a deep heave to the end zone late in the second half. He also ran for 25 yards while enduring three sacks.
Taylorville coach Jeb Odam, Baron’s father, said about seven or eight players contribute on both sides of the ball with a roster of just 41 players.
“It's a little exhausting,” Baron said of playing both ways, “but we work hard in practice, and we stay conditioned.”
Going to the ground
Baron said the offense is much-improved from last season owing to more experience. Last year's team featured 29 sophomores, eight juniors and seven seniors to provide some perspective.
The Tornadoes are only just a couple of plays from turning the proverbial corner, according to Jeb.
"We're a block away, we're a pass away, we're a tackle away, and we haven't quite gotten to that point," Jeb said. "We'll make it 80% of the time, but it's those 20% that's kind of putting us behind. Whether that's a practice or personnel change, we've got to find a way as coaches to get them in the right spot to get over that hump."
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Taylorville emphasizes a physical run game and totaled 40 rushing attempts for 97 yards against Mount Zion. Odam and senior running back Thomas Gettings, who had 62 rushing yards, had 18 carries apiece.
This is Gettings’ first year on offense. He also starts on the defensive line.
“I honestly think we do work really well together, and we've all improved from last year,” Gettings said of Odam. “He's a strong runner, I'll give him that.”
Jeb described his son as generally taciturn but equally as competitive as dad.
“If you know Baron well enough, he doesn't say very much,” Jeb said. “I'll yell at him all day long, and he'll just stare at me. It's water off a duck's back for him and then he'll come out and make plays like that (against Trimble). He almost had another interception. He's a great competitor, and he won't let you know about it until the play happens. It's just who he is.”
Baron said dad can be scrappy at times. He's also learned a thing or two from his cousin.
What might one of those lessons be?
“Definitely how to handle my dad,” Baron jested.
Contact Bill Welt: 788-1545, bill.welt@sj-r.com, Twitter.com/BillWelt
This article originally appeared on State Journal-Register: IHSA football: Meet the junior QB running the Taylorville offense
