Baby face

By Michael Ashcraft –

On a grassy decline in the Santa Monica mountains, an ancient ritual took place in July in which two local adolescents were initiated into manhood.

As fathers, uncles and mentors stood around, Zeke Young and Zion Jenkins, students of Lighthouse Christian Academy, ran a timed mountain path challenge – a physical test – and received counsel and prayer for a circle of Christian men.

Where the Spartans had their agoge and the native Americans required youths to complete a hunt, Lighthouse men are doing this.

Zeke Young, a senior, got another physical and emotional challenge Friday night as he quarterbacked through pain the clear win against Vista Meridian Global Academy that a sideline ref made into a loss by bizarrely whistling a reception out of bounds.

Zion Jenkins, a junior, caught an out and landed his feet in play (video proves) in the final minute of the game to give LCA its first win, but the ref waved his hands that it was out of bounds to the chagrin of the the Saints who had fought grindingly against a team twice their size.

The official score: 38-40, the four straight loss for Lighthouse 8-man football.

Zeke, 17, turned the bitter frustration into a character-building experience, another stepping stone into manhood.

“It shows you’re more of a man if you can overcome things that are hard. In life, we’re going to have to overcome things as men, being able to overcome what shouldn’t have been a loss is how we can be transformed into men. We were super angry last night, but we didn’t play dirty. We had to keep our heads up.”

This epiphany comes in contrast to the myriad man-childs out there with Peter Pan syndrome, or gamers carrying out a life sentence of video games, or black-pilled incels who have retreated from manhood because been told by the Barbie movie that they are useless, toxic and patriarchal. (The proper but less recognizable plural of man-child is men-children.)

As it stands, Lighthouse lost. But the boys won. Years from now when unfair adversity steals what they deserve, they won’t crumble, take refuge at the bar, lash out or succumb to life-long therapy. Where are the good fathers today?

On Saturday, Zeke was bedridden. He got hit from behind and front and smacked his tailbone down on a helmet late in the first half. He was in excruciating pain. But Lighthouse had no backup quarterback. So Zeke had to play.

He had to man up.

“I knew that if I was able to push for two quarters that it would be over soon. I knew I had to take some of the load,” Zeke says. “I knew I had to keep running for us to have a shot.”

For three years at LCA, Zeke has been the blue-eyed blondie, the runt of the school. Throughout freshman, sophomore and junior years, he was known as the good kid, the principal’s son who was always diligent, did all his homework and never got into trouble.

He was always a piece of American pie, with a Norman Rockwell face, that beamed wholesomeness and never intimidated. There appeared nothing dangerous about him.

Not anymore.

As a senior, Zeke shed the baby face. He got tough, both inside and out. As Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson says, he became a controlled monster – the opposite of the insecure tyrant who is truly dangerous because he lacks the manliness to be dangerous to a predator.

He became, and is becoming, a man.

Lighthouse was winning 24-18 at half. They were outgunned by a team twice their size, but as Coach Justin Kayne said at half: “It’s gonna be a battle. It’s gonna be a matter of who wants it most.”

The Vista Meridian Eagles received the kickoff and carried the ball upfield to score, that with the extra points made it 24-26.

When the Saints received the ball, they advanced through successive plays but were ground down shy of a touchdown and turned over on fourth down.

The Eagles countered to try to seal the game. But Tony Pellot, reaching deep within himself, determined to push through and shut down the Eagles. He pressured the quarterback, who threw an interception to LCA’s Zion.

On the Saints' turn, LCA almost scored, but Owen Toomey didn’t make the catch. The subsequent punt was blocked.

The Eagles attacked to TD but failed to get the extra points.

The 3rd quarter was a hard-fought grinding back-and-forth affair that saw the Eagles get the upper hand. It was 24-32.

In the 4th quarter, LCA started brightly with a long pass to Zion, brought down just shy of the end zone. A subsequent reception again to Zion got the TD, followed up by a 2-point conversion, tying the game at 32-32.

In all of its offense, Vista Meridian depended heavily on one running back, #32. Because of his speed, swirls, cuts and stops, and because we don't know his name, we’ll call him Ozzy Osbourne’s Crazy Train.

Crazy Train scored a TD and extra points to seize the lead 32-40.

Responding in kind, Zion caught a spectacular pass and shifted straight into fifth gear to blaze into the end zone, making it 38-40.

A bungled onside kick gave good field position to the Eagles, but some hot-footed coverage by Owen Toomey critically foiled a TD pass and forced turnover to LCA.

With three minutes left in the game and LCA on its last drive to snatch the win, Zeke had to ignore his pain the most. He made two runs, getting first downs twice.

“At halftime, they gave me a couple of Advils,” Zeke remembers. “I knew Coach wasn’t going to take me out. Coach came over to me and said, ‘I know you’re hurting but these are moments you’ll never forget.’ So I kept going.”

Those runs were probably his best of the game, the best of his high school football career. He weaved through opponents fearlessly. There was something different about those runs than his runs from last year.

Within striking distance, Zeke threw an out to Zion, who caught it, landed his feet in bounds and in the end zone. Fans went wild. LCA had gotten its first season win. The score would be 44-40.

But the ref, incredibly, whistled and waved. He ruled it out of bounds. Video footage of the play affirms this reporting, but high school refs do not review video.

Players could have whined, cried, argued. Instead, they did the manly thing. They played the next two downs to try to confirm what they were denied. They failed to score.

“The ref cheated us,” said Coach Justin. “That’s all I got to say. Our boys fought hard. The ref took away a touchdown from us at the end of the game. We were robbed of the game. They came back from adversity and won the game, it’s taken from them. It’s just not fair to them when they’re working as hard as they are.”

Official score: 38-40.

What do you do after that? Whimper, whine, simmer, fume?

Zeke lay in bed Saturday recovering from pain. He looked brightly forward, like a man.

“We’ve got practice on Monday. We’re going to get ready for Saturday.”

About this writer: Michael Ashcraft teaches journalism, literature and Spanish at the Lighthouse Christian Academy of Santa Monica.