Document text
A Boom at South Junior quarterback has the Panthers off to their best start since 1994 By Don Hunt Boomer Marshall has gotten off to perhaps the best start of any quarterback in South Medford High School football history. And no one close to the situation is surprised. The 6-foot-2�, 220-pound junior is the top-ranked passer in the Southern Oregon Conference through the first month of the season. He has completed 65 of 98 passes for 982 yards, 12 touchdowns and only two interceptions for the 4-0 and ninth-ranked Panthers, who meet 0-4 Crater tonight at 7:30 at Spiegelberg Stadium. Although the Panthers� rise to respectability over the past two seasons can be attributed to a lot of factors, it all started with Marshall taking over the signal-calling duties as a sophomore. Confident to the point of being brash, Marshall feels as comfortable in Spiegelberg Stadium as he does his living room. And that�s no coincidence, since Marshall�s house is only a block away from the stadium. He has been to every South Medford home game since he was in diapers. He was the Panthers� ballboy for six years. His two older brothers , Pete and Scott, starred for the team in the 1980s. And his father, Dan, coached Boomer all the way through middle school. "This place really does feel like a second home to me," Marshall says as he glances around the 8,000-seat stadium, empty on this day except for some cross country runners jogging along the track. "I kind of look at it as my sanctuary." When Marshall entered South, the Panthers had won a total of three games in three years. Such failure wasn�t acceptable to Marshall and his talented group of classmates, who went unbeaten in football and basketball at McLaughlin Middle School. They couldn�t turn around the program overnight, but as sophomores a year ago, they helped the team to a 5-5 record and a state-playoff berth for the first time in six years. The breakthrough game was a 14-9 upset victory over Grants Pass that clinched a playoff spot and convinced the players they belonged in the upper echelon of the SOC. "That was a major stepping stone," nods Marshall. "That removed all doubt that we could line up with the better teams in this league and beat them." Churchill crushed the Panthers, 57-7, in the first round of the playoffs, but Marshall and his teammates weren�t discouraged. They simply worked harder in the off-season. Marshall worked to improve his foot speed and attended a camp at Oregon State that featured some of the top high school players in the country. On the final day of the camp, he found himself playing quarterback on the all-star team. "That camp definitely raised my level of play," Marshall says. "I improved some technical stuff, but just being around good players made me better." Marshall threw for a school-record 346 yards and five touchdowns in a 44-2 victory over Redmond on Sept. 14 and then re-broke the record with 363 yards passing in a 36-13 win over Eagle Point last Friday. He�s on pace to throw for 2,200 yards and 27 touchdowns, not including the playoffs. "What Boomer is doing is no surprise to me," says South coach Bill Singler, who was an all-Pac-10 receiver at Stanford in the early 1970s. "He�s got a strong arm, he reads the field well and he pays attention to detail. "Plus, he�s got a real good supporting cast." Indeed, South Medford�s receiving corps is among the best in the state. Senior Ryan Heil is the leading receiver in the SOC, with 19 catches for 320 yards, and his eight touchdowns are No. 1 among the state�s receivers. Junior Ryan Benson has 19 catches for 232 yards and junior Eric Fischer has 15 catches for 201 yards and one TD. "We haven�t had more than one or two dropped passes all year," Singler says. "That�s a nice group of receivers." Junior tailback Andres Reed has kept defenses honest by running for a league-leading 556 yards and seven scores. The unsung bunch has been the Panthers� offensive line, which has consistently opened holes for the running game and kept Marshall�s uniform nice and clean during each outing. Marshall has been sacked only twice, and both of those came when he found no one open and decided to take the loss rather than throw the ball up for grabs. Mindful of the toiling in the trenches, Marshall had his linemen over for streak dinner two weeks ago and plans to have them back a couple more times this fall. "My dad will probably go broke, but it�s worth it to me," he says with a grin. "Our line has really come together. They�re all seniors and they take a lot of pride in what they do." Barring injury, Marshall is likely to set all the South Medford passing records by the time he graduates. After that, he hopes to play college football for a Division I school, preferably Oregon or Oregon State. Just give him a room somewhere close to the stadium. Reach reporter Don Hunt at 776-4469, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.