Football isn’t just a sport for Sophomore Jonathan Phillips, it’s his life. He has a goal of one day getting a scholarship to whichever college.

He has played for eight years, since the third grade.

“I like football because football is more of a team sport,” he said. “You have more of a team atmosphere.”

His position is center and linebacker. But, playing these positions isn’t always simple. The hardest thing for him is when he plays as a center and he has to go up against the much bigger defensive linemen. When he’s playing linebacker, his struggles are when the running backs are to fast for him.

Sometimes, if his player slides by he tells himself ‘I can’t go back and fix mistakes on the last play so I need to make up fot it on the next play.’

But all this came to an end. One tackle changed his game for rest of the season.

While playing linebacker, during the Tokay High game he got tackled and sprained his knee.

“I was relieved that it wasn’t as bad as it could have been,” he said. “I have seen two people go down with serious knee injuries and they are for almost a year out, so I’m happy I only had to take 4 weeks off.”

In school, he is the only sophomore in Calculus. To balance, both sports and school he tries to do all he can in class. If he doesn’t finish, he does it before he goes to sleep or in the morning.

Recently, he was awarded the Delta King which mixed between being a leader and most valuable player.