OABCIG football’s perfect season
IDA GROVE, Iowa (BVM) — “We’re just happy to be in the conversation.”
That’s what OABCIG’s head football coach Larry Allen had to say about his team being nominated for The Des Moines Register Sports Awards Team of the Year honor.
To be nominated for this award you have to win a state championship. The Falcons went undefeated en route to claiming the Class 2A title, the program’s first-ever state championship. It was the perfect season.
“It was unexpected to say the least, but it sure was fun,” said Allen about the championship season. They had lost seniors to graduation and transitioned wide receiver Cooper DeJean to quarterback.
The team was doing well, but coach Allen said it wasn’t until a Week 9 match against Greene County, also undefeated at the time, that the buzz around the team started to grow.
“We handled them pretty well and I think that was where people kind of thought you know maybe we are
going to be OK in the postseason,” said Allen.
They were more than OK and Dejean, in his first season at quarterback, threw for over 4,800 yards while also scoring 66 touchdowns.
This was a special team that rose to celebrity status within the community. Complete strangers would go out of their way to congratulate players or wish them good luck when they would see them downtown.
“It rallied our communities together,” said Allen referring to the four towns that make up OABCIG High School: Odebolt, Arthur, Battle Creek and Ida Grove. “It’s our tenth year of being whole grade sharing and now it’s consolidated a couple years ago and you know there were some tough times along the way for that and this really helped bring everyone together in all the communities.”
A historic run that will be remembered for a long time by the communities that came together to witness perfection.
