- April 25, 2024
-
-
Loading
Loading
With nine touchdowns and more than 750 all-purpose yards, Seabreeze running back Josh Stevens is just another dynamic weapon in coach Marc Beach’s repertoire.
BY ANDREW O'BRIEN | SPORTS EDITOR
Just three days after losing by 41 points to Cocoa, the Seabreeze football team finished out its practice Monday with sprints. Coach Marc Beach yelled out stats that stood out from the game. And the players kept running.
But when conditioning was over, running back Josh Stevens took his helmet off. His smile was still wide across his face, just like it always is.
That’s because Stevens, a senior, is always smiling. He’s always happy, said teammate and fellow senior Charles Nelson.
“That’s just him,” Nelson said. “He is liked by everybody. You can’t get mad at him because he always has a smile and says sorry.”
Growing up in Pop Warner football, Stevens was always a valued player. A gifted athlete with natural speed and strength, it was only a matter of time before he was a star player on a high school team.
But by the time high school rolled around, problems away from the field developed, and so Stevens’ dad, Corrice Stevens, told his son he wasn’t allowed to play football during his freshman year at Seabreeze.
“I got into trouble,” Stevens said Monday after practice. “It was just a couple of things, like my attitude — I acted like I knew everything.”
By sophomore year, Stevens had matured, and his dad let him tryout. He made the junior varsity team.
Last year, as a junior, Stevens was promoted to the varsity squad, but he was deep on the depth chart behind stars such as Nelson and Trey Rodriguez.
It was a different scenario for Stevens, who said he was always a starter growing up.
Over the summer, however, Rodriguez transferred to Mainland, and a vacancy at running back opened up. It was Stevens’ time to shine for the Sandcrabs.
And through the first six games this season, he’s seized that opportunity, carrying the ball 75 times for 628 yards (about 8.3 yards per carry) and seven touchdowns. Stevens also has 11 catches for 156 yards and two touchdowns.
In Seabreeze’s 49-36 come-from-behind win over Bartram Trail, Stevens put the team on his back, rushing for a career-high 229 yards and four touchdowns.
“Josh is a great athlete,” Nelson said. “He just puts in so much work on and off the field. He’s a leader.”
Standing at 5 feet, 9 inches, and 175 pounds, Stevens runs a 4.5-second 40-yard dash. But he said it’s not necessarily his speed that has made him successful out of the backfield.
“I think it’s because I keep running even though I get hit,” he said. “I work hard in the weight room, and I run hard.”
Beach agrees, saying that Stevens has done a great job transitioning from nose guard to running back.
“He works extremely hard in the weight room and on the practice field,” Beach said. “He is a great leader. He is what we want from players in our program.”
And although Stevens is finally under the spotlight as one of Seabreeze’s go-to players, he doesn’t consider himself “the man.”
“I don’t put myself as the guy,” he said. “I kind of put myself as, you know, the person that can make plays on this team, too. And I hope everyone else thinks that, too.”
Seabreeze (5-1) travels to Deltona 7 p.m. Friday in a District 4-6A game. And Stevens says there’s plenty of work left to do.
“We’re not trying to lose at all after (the Cocoa game),” he said. “It was a learning experience. ... You win some, you lose some. You have to know that to get better.”
